Romans Chapter 13

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Alright guys, take out your Bibles and turn to Romans 13.
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Alright so, you guys realize we've been going through Romans one chapter at a time.
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What often happens is we get sort of bogged down at the beginning of the chapter, because I start teaching verse by verse, and I get to a couple of verses and 45 minutes comes and goes quick.
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So we were a long time in Galatians, but I did that verse by verse.
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This I'm doing chapter by chapter, so it's a little bit of a different study.
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However, I do want to make mention of something, and I'll mention this before we read.
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In Romans chapter 13, most people focus on the beginning of the chapter, which deals with our responsibility to governing authorities, and that will be the vast majority of our time today will be spent on verses 1 to 7.
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However, there is a passage at the end of this chapter, which again we probably won't get to really look at it a lot, but that's why I'm mentioning it now.
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Verse 13 and 14 of this chapter has a historic importance in the life of St.
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Augustine.
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Now if you're a Florida boy, you probably call him St.
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Augustine, and so that's okay too.
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But St.
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Augustine was a man who lived in the 4th and 5th century of church history.
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He's considered to be one of the later of the church fathers.
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He wrote in a way that had impact for, well, all the way until now.
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He was one of the main voices in the life of men like Martin Luther and John Calvin and others who cited him as a source of their theology in the sense of helping them formulate their language.
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So St.
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Augustine has an important role in the history of the church.
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But St.
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Augustine began his life in many ways as a reprobate.
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He was a philanderer, he was somewhat of a scoundrel.
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He was a man who liked wine, women, and song, I guess you'd say.
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Well, his mother was a Christian, his father was a pagan, and his mother's name was Monica, and she prayed for her son desperately that he would know the Lord, that he would be saved.
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And instead of following her footsteps, he followed in his father's footsteps in many ways and was known as a very sinful person.
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One day, he heard a voice of a child, and whether or not it was a real child or it was in his mind or whatever, it's a little unclear, but he heard a voice of a child saying, Tolelege, Tolelege, which is a phrase which means take up and read.
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And he took that as a sign that he needed to read the Scriptures, that he needed to read the Bible.
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And he opened the Bible that he had, that was available to him, and he read verses 13 and 14 of this chapter.
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And this is what it says, and like I said, we're going to read the whole chapter in a minute, but I just want to read this first.
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Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies or in drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desires.
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That passage became the passage, much like Romans 1, 16, 17 was the passage that changed Martin Luther's life, this passage became the passage that changed St.
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Augustine's life.
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And he saw his life, which was one of orgies and things and sinfulness, and he saw this passage speaking directly to him and calling him to reject those things and turn to Christ in repentance.
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So like I said, I thought it would be good, since I know we probably won't get all the way down the chapter today, to at least point out the fact that there is some historic significance to the last two verses of this chapter.
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With that being said, let's read the entire chapter together.
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Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
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For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.
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Therefore, whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment.
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For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad.
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Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval.
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For he is God's servant for your good.
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But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain.
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For he is a servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.
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Therefore, one must be in subjection not only to avoid God's wrath, but also for the sake of conscience.
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For because of this you also pay taxes for the authorities or ministers of God attending to this very thing.
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Pay to all what is owed to them.
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Taxes to whom taxes are owed.
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Revenue to whom revenue is owed.
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Respect to whom respect is owed.
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Honor to whom honor is owed.
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Owe no one anything except to love one another.
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For the one that loves another has fulfilled the law.
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For the commandments, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not covet, and any other commandment are summed up in this word.
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You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
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Love does no wrong to a neighbor.
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Therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.
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Besides this, you know the time that the hour has come to wake from sleep.
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For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.
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The night is far gone, the day is at hand.
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So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.
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Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies or drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desires.
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Let's pray.
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Father, I thank You for Your Word.
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I thank You for its truth.
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And I pray even now, Lord, that as we seek to have an understanding of Your Word, that You would keep me from error.
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For Lord, I am a fallible man, incapable of preaching error, and I don't want to.
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I pray for the believers in this room, Lord, that You would use this as a time of edification for them and for those who do not yet believe in Christ, that You would use this as a time to challenge them, to show them that there is only one name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved, and that is the name of Jesus Christ.
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We pray all this in His name.
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Amen.
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On September 11, 2001, I was driving in a bread truck over on Atlantic Boulevard.
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I was delivering some bread for Flowers Bakery to Publix.
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And I walked in with my stack of bread, and as I walked in and began to...
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You have to scan it in as you go.
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As I began to scan it in, I was talking to the guy there, and a man walked up to both of us quickly and said, Hey, did you hear? A plane hit a building in New York.
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And I figured it was a Cessna.
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Maybe somebody got off course, got taken by the wind.
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Figured it was an accident.
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But by the time I had stacked my empty crates up and I got back out and rolled them into the truck and began to prepare for the next stop, I got in and turned the radio on.
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By that time, the second plane had hit.
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And it was very clear that we were under attack.
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We know later another plane went down in Pennsylvania, and other things had happened throughout the day.
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Well, that was a Tuesday.
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The next day was Wednesday.
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And my wife and I were members of our church, and so, as was our custom, we went to church that Wednesday night.
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And it was full.
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Every church in America was full on Wednesday, September 12.
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Everybody was at church.
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And people were crying, and people were sharing stories and talking about some had lost loved ones.
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I mean, thousands of people died that day, and people have loved ones all over the world.
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So we had conversations, and one of the elders came to me and said, and this was before I was in ministry, but I was a member of the church and I had been working some with the youth at that time.
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One of the elders came to me and said, hey, our pastor has been in a car wreck.
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He can't preach Sunday.
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He's injured his back, and we need somebody to preach.
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Will you preach? Now that became my first sermon.
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My first sermon that I ever preached was on the Sunday after 9-11.
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At least the first one I remember.
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History will tell me at some point maybe there was something before that, but I don't remember preaching before that Sunday.
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And that Sunday became the Sunday that I felt the call of God to preach, make that my life's mission, because when I stood in the pulpit that Sunday, even though I'm sure if I went back now and listened to the sermon, I would probably be very embarrassed because I was very green, but at the same time, I knew that was what God had called me to do.
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And I only tell this story because the passage that I preached on the Sunday after 9-11 was Romans 13.
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The government does not bear the sword in vain.
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That was the passage I preached.
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And the reason why I preached that was because I was trying to point out to the congregation that the government bears an important responsibility in the protection of its people and the thwarting of enemies.
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And that's why it says it does not bear the sword in vain.
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The government has been given the power of the sword to protect its people from enemies, foreign and domestic, we say, in our Constitution, right? And so, this passage means a lot to me.
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As I said, first real sermon, I remember preaching, but also, it was as bad as the sermon was, I think I got my point across.
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My point was this.
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We need to pray for our government because we've been attacked and we're about to go to war.
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Somehow, somewhere, we're going to be fighting because of this and we need to pray for those who are going to be fighting and we need to pray for those who are going to be making decisions about those who fight and we need to be praying for our leaders.
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So, that was the sermon.
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It was a call to prayer.
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But as I said, this passage has some significance for me historically and this is a passage that often becomes one that people will debate as to its meaning and I want to sort of address some of the debates today because perhaps some of you have read this passage and you've come away questioning what does it really mean.
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Maybe some of you have read it and used it in a way that would maybe be not keeping with what it actually says and my hope is that today will be very relevant in your life because I want to also speak about another historical moment.
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9-11 obviously affected us all, but another historical moment was two, now almost three years ago, a pandemic hit beginning in China, making its way across the seas, came to the United States and I remember at the time my wife was working for a company that she taught Chinese children English.
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She did it online and so she knew about this virus that was going around China and she told me.
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She said, hey, there's a big deal over there and I didn't, you know, oh, it's a big deal.
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You know, they've got bird flu and all these different things.
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I didn't figure anything out.
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You know, it's just going to be another virus that we've got to deal with.
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Never in my life did I think that within two or three weeks everything was going to shut down and people weren't going to be able to go to work.
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People weren't going to be able to buy toilet paper.
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People were going to be barred from the church.
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Not Walmart.
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That's true.
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They weren't barred from Walmart.
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No, I'm being serious though.
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That's messed up.
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No, no, yeah, yeah.
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And the point I'm, again, all of this is driving to a point.
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The churches were closed and in many states it was illegal to open the doors.
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In Canada, it was absolutely by punishment of law, by punishment of imprisonment, there was a pastor, James Coates, who went to jail because he opened his church during the pandemic.
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But the liquor stores could stay open.
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Yeah, well, that's kind of going with what he was saying.
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So, the question arose during that initial phase of the pandemic of what allegiance does the church have to the government authority when it comes to the subject of worship in California? You could have a church service but you couldn't sing because singing would create vaporous spittle which would infect others.
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Or if you had service, you had to, you know, dress like you were going to Mars.
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You had to wear suits and all these different things, masks.
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And only now, only within the last couple of weeks has Baptist Hospital lifted the mask mandate.
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I know that because I went there to see someone and I wore a mask and they said, you don't have to wear it.
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You know, it's gone.
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So, the point of all this is to say Paul is saying something here about the government.
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And some people interpret this to say Paul is saying whatever the government says, no matter what, you have to do it.
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And I think if you interpret it that way that we are missing the point.
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But that is what has led.
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There are still churches that haven't opened back up.
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They just went all online because of the pandemic.
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It's almost three years now.
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And it's all online.
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Well, I guess not yet.
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In March of 2023 will be three years.
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In fact, funny story, set free story.
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And I know I'm telling a lot of stories.
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Set free story though.
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When the pandemic hit, our church was doing some remodeling and some of the guys from here were helping me put tiles in the ceiling.
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We had ceiling tiles, new ones going in.
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And anytime you do work for me, I try to take you to lunch, you know, and have a good lunch, have a good conversation.
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So, we got ready to go to lunch.
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We went down to Arby's and we noticed not a lot of cars on the road.
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Again, we've been working all day, so we had no idea what was going on.
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We get to Arby's.
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We walk in.
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They said, you can't come in.
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It was the day of the lockdown.
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It was the day the governor locked the state down.
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We didn't know it had happened because we've been working at the church since like 6 a.m.
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We didn't know that it came across the wire, but it had come across the wire.
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All the tables, chairs were up on the tables.
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Couldn't come in, couldn't eat.
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You could buy food and leave, but you couldn't come in and sit and eat.
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And I looked at my friend and I said, the world will never be the same.
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I said, this is unprecedented.
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I've lived 42 years, and I know that ain't a long time, but it's long enough that I've seen some stuff.
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And I've never seen this.
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I've never seen us willing to stop life because of the potential of sickness.
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And yet, we did.
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So, looking back again at Romans 13, let's walk through the text and try to understand what Paul's saying.
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First of all, he says, let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
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It's a simple sentence, not difficult to interpret.
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In this, we do have to define some things though.
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When he says let every person, it is clear that he is talking to believers.
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Romans is written to believers.
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Romans is given to us as Christians.
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So, he's speaking to us if we are, in fact, believers in Christ.
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One could say he's speaking to every man because every man has a responsibility to be in some way subject to the government.
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But Romans isn't written to every single person.
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Romans is written to believers.
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So, anytime you see the word every person, it's within the context of the church.
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And he says, let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
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Now, for a moment, it's important to address the word subjection or to be subject to something.
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To be subject to something, it means exactly what it sounds like.
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It means to be under their subjection or under their authority, to be under their rule.
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Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
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And that is, again, it sounds like there's no exception.
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Just let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
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Let every person live under the rule of the authorities.
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And he doubles down in the very next sentence.
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He says, for there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.
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So, right there, you take a step back and you say, wait a minute, does that mean that whoever's in charge is there because of God's decree? Well, as good Calvinists, we can affirm that.
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We can say that God is not caught by surprise by the elections, even the ones that are stolen.
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But God is not caught by surprise by whoever is in charge.
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In fact, the Bible tells us in the Old Testament that God raises up kings.
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He raises up authorities, that He is the one who actually establishes them.
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John Calvin makes a very important statement in his writings on this subject.
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He says when God wants to judge a people, He gives them wicked rulers.
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When God wants to judge a nation, or a people, or a kingdom, He will give them a wicked king.
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And you say, well, where does that come from? Well, look back at the Old Testament.
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Look at the history of Israel, and look at how there were risen up one after the other after the other.
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In the Northern Kingdom, never did they once have a good king.
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But always and continually, they had evil kings.
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And in the Southern Kingdom, they only had a few good kings, and the rest were evil themselves.
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And it was a judgment against a people.
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A wicked ruler is a judgment against a people.
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So does God raise up wicked rulers? Well, we can say yes, in the sense that He uses them in the same way that God used Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian Empire to judge Israel in their wickedness as He used Assyria and their wickedness to judge the Northern Kingdom in 722.
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We can see God using the wicked for His purpose of judgment.
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And God makes no apologies.
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He doesn't ask for your permission, neither does He ask for your advice.
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He doesn't say, okay, B.J., what do you think? Because He doesn't care.
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But God is not subject to vote.
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When I say He doesn't care, I'm not saying He doesn't care about you.
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But what I am saying is God is not subject to you.
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God is not subject to your vote.
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God is not subject to your opinion.
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In fact, Romans 9 makes it very clear when He says, who are you, old man, to answer back to God? Who are you? People always say, when I get to see God, I'm going to tell Him what I think.
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No, when you see God, you're going to be face down in the dirt.
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Because the Bible says no one will stand in the presence of God.
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Don't think that you're going to talk back to God.
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That doesn't work that way.
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So it says, let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
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There is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.
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God does raise up authorities.
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But now we have to ask this question.
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Is this statement absolute? Or are there any exceptions to what Paul is saying? I would immediately say there are.
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But even built into this statement, I think that Paul assumes that there would be because of the word that he uses, which is the word subject.
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Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
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If we read the Scriptures, we will read other places where people are called to be subjected to one another.
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Like for instance, the wife in Ephesians 5 is told to do what? Wives, be subject to your husbands, as unto the Lord, right? That she is to obey her husband in the sense that he is put as an authority over her.
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Yet at the same time, we understand that that authority is limited because the husband, even though he has authority over his wife, does not have the authority to abuse her.
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And if he did abuse her and she sought safety from that abuse, then she would not be in the wrong if the husband were abusing their children and the wife sought to separate to protect the children.
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She would not necessarily be wrong.
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So the subject between husband and wife, the subjection, is limited to a responsibility on his part to be a good governor.
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So you understand there's responsibility on both sides.
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There's responsibility to be subject to the authority, but there is also responsibility on the part of the authority to do what is right.
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And I'll show you this.
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This is actually in Romans 13.
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Look with me here where he says, verse 2, he says, Therefore whoever resists the authorities, resists what God has appointed, those who resist will incur judgment, for rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad.
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Well, that's not always true, is it? Sometimes rulers do punish good conduct.
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And I need look no further than the Scriptures to prove my point.
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In the book of Daniel, Daniel has three associates.
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Their names are Hananiah, Meshach, and Azariah.
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We know them as what? Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
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Now, why are they called Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego? Because when they were taken from Israel and they were deported to Babylon, they were deported and they were changed their names.
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That's one of the ways that in the ancient world when someone wanted to give his expression of authority over another, he would change that person's name.
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Even Daniel has a different name.
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Daniel's name is not Daniel.
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In the book, he's called Belteshazzar because that was a name that was Babylonian.
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Their religion was...
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I forget, it starts with a C.
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Chaldonian, yeah.
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There is a connection.
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Actually, when I was preaching to Genesis, I made that connection.
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God demonstrating His power and giving them a new name.
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And the Bible also says we get a new name when we come to Christ.
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We are given a new name.
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No, it's the idea we are called His.
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Our names are written on His hand.
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We become His children.
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It's like when you adopt a child and they get your last name.
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We get that position of relationship.
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So when Daniel and his three compadres were taken to Babylon, they were given new names.
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They tried to change the way they ate.
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Remember all these things? Remember this story? They tried to basically make them Chaldeans.
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Tried to make them like them.
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But Daniel and his friends would not submit.
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Now, they were not rebellious in the sense that they didn't fight back, but they appealed for certain dispensations.
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They wanted him to eat from the king's table.
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They said, no, can we just eat vegetables and water? Well, we don't want you to do that because you're not going to be healthy.
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Let us eat vegetables and water for a temporary time and you'll see that we'll be just as healthy as everybody else.
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And at the end of the day, they were more healthy.
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Even though the other people were eating sumptuously from the king's table, their bodies were more healthy even though they were eating a relatively simple diet.
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Later, there was a statue that the king erected.
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And the statue was erected as an ornament of worship.
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And the king said, everyone will come and bow down at this statue.
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And there were three young men who did not bow down.
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Even though the king was an authority and even though we are told to be subject to the governing authorities, they recognize that there is an authority over the authority.
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And so does Paul.
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Paul says there is no authority except that which comes from God, which makes God what? The greater authority.
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God's authority is greater than man's authority.
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So when Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego face Nebuchadnezzar and he says, you will bow down or you will be burned.
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They said, one of the greatest lines in Scripture.
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Well, they said, we have no need to answer you in this matter.
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Yes, you do.
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From a human standpoint, this is the most important man in the world.
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This man has conquered empires and you're going to look him in the face and say we don't really need to give you an answer.
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That sounds sarcastic.
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But what they were saying is our answer is already given.
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We're not going to bow.
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We don't have a reason to give you an answer.
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You know what our answer is.
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We're not going to bow.
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And our God is able to deliver us from your hand.
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But even if He doesn't, we will not bow.
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Even if He doesn't deliver us from your hand, we're not going to bow down to that statue.
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So we know the story.
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Nebuchadnezzar throws them in the fire.
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God saves them, delivers them.
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Not too long later in the book of Daniel, Daniel's faced with a very similar situation.
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There's a prohibition against prayer.
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Sort of similar like a prohibition about going to church.
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Can't pray.
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You know what Daniel did? He went out onto the patio and he prayed in the face of everyone.
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I'm told I can't pray.
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I'm going to go out on my porch and I'm going to pray.
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And whatever happens, happens.
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That's right.
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He prayed.
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He was taken to the lion's den.
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The king didn't want to do it.
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By the way, that story I don't have time to go into it.
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The king didn't want to do it.
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The king had connected himself by oath that he must punish anybody who doesn't obey.
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But yeah, the other guys were trying to get Daniel in trouble.
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So they ended up finally, he goes in the lion's den, the king spends all night fasting.
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The text tells us he fasts all night so that Daniel would be saved.
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And he runs to the lion's den and he hollers, and Daniel, did your God deliver you? Yes, He did.
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The lion's mouth has been shut all night.
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So He delivered him and takes him out.
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But the reason why I point out these two scenarios in the book of Daniel is you have a governing authority which has gone beyond the power that God has established in a reasonable way.
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They have made themselves God.
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They have demanded worship for themselves.
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And therefore, God's men said, we will not bow.
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Now, we're not going to fight you.
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We're not going to take up arms against you, but we're not going to bow down to you.
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You have a responsibility.
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We have a responsibility.
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Our responsibility is to submit.
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Your responsibility is to be good governors.
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And you have failed.
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Therefore, we will not submit.
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New Testament.
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In the book of Acts.
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Different form of government.
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Because in the book of Acts, the apostles are brought before the leaders of the Jewish people.
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Now, this is after Christ.
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This is after the death, burial, and resurrection.
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They're preaching the Gospel.
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And the Bible says they're turning the world upside down when they're preaching.
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So, they're brought before the Jewish leaders.
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And the Jewish leaders say, you are not allowed to preach anymore in the name of Jesus.
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Well, what they say is, are we to obey God or men? When it comes to obedience, obedience to God will always trump obedience to men.
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That's their point.
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So, if the government commands that we do something that violates the law of God, if the government commands that we do something that would violate our worship of God, if the government commands that we do not worship God, we must obey God rather than men.
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Yes, sir? There was just something, I think it was during the BLM movement or whatever it was, when we were watching the bow down of Judaism.
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A lot of people were beat up and killed because they wouldn't.
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The last couple of years, we've seen a lot of mistakes.
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A lot of people have made a lot of bad decisions.
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And some of it wasn't the government.
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Some of it was groups, different groups doing bad things.
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I think I know what you're talking about.
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I've seen some pictures of people in authority who bowed down and got down on their knees and stuff.
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And I do think there's some silliness in all that, some wrong-headed thinking.
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But getting back to here, what we're talking about, we have a responsibility to be good citizens.
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We actually do have a responsibility to the government.
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If one of my church members came to me and said, I don't care what the government says about this, I'm going to do what I want to do, I would have to consider what they're asking or what they're saying.
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Because the government does have the right and the responsibility to govern for the sake of the good of the people.
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And I want to point this out because the answer to a bad government is not no government.
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And that's what a lot of people think.
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Anarchy is best.
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And anarchy simply means no government.
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And the idea is the answer to a bad government is no government.
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That's not true.
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Because both are equally bad.
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If you have a bad government, you're going to have to deal with a bad government.
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But if you have no government, you're going to have to deal with a bad populace.
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You're going to have to deal with people who have no checks against their own wickedness.
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What does the Bible say? When there's no authority, men do what is right in their own eyes.
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And when men do what is right in their own eyes, what happens? Only evil continually, right? Go back to Genesis in the book of Judges.
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We see when there's no governor, there's no...
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In fact, Lieutenant Colonel Dave Grossman, former Army Ranger, he's a personal friend of mine.
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I know him personally.
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And I've had him on my podcast.
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And I've spent some time with him in the past.
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He's a great man.
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He said this in a talk he had.
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I got to go and sit in on one of his lectures here in Jacksonville.
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And he said this.
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He said, We can go a day...
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As a people, we can go a day without water.
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We can go a day without food.
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He said, but you can't go a day without justice.
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You can't go one day where everyone was allowed to just do whatever they wanted with no penalty.
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He said, because if you had one day like that, you would never be able to pick up the pieces.
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Never be able to pick up the pieces.
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If there was one day where everything was legal, there was no government, there was no authority, there was no nothing.
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He said, you'd never be able to pick up the pieces.
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Now they made a movie about that.
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I've never seen it, but there is a movie about it.
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It's called The Purge.
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But the whole idea of the movie is one day a year you can do whatever you want.
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Kill, murder, steal, whatever.
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And they make it like, yeah, well if one day a year you can do what you want, the other 364 days you'll be fine.
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No, if one day...
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Imagine one day where there was no authority.
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There was no one to check and balance the evil in our hearts.
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It would be like they talk about letting the cat out of the bag.
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You ain't getting the cat back in the bag.
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Now I do want to mention one other thing and I'm running low on time.
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I always like to point this out.
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The Bible establishes three areas of authority in the life of every person, but specifically the life of the Christian.
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There are three areas of authority that we must not forget.
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I draw three circles.
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The first area of authority in the life of every person is the family.
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You were born into a family.
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You had a father.
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You had a mother.
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And what does God say? Honor your father and mother, right? So there's an establishment of authority there.
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You say, well, I had a bad father.
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I am not arguing that.
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You might have had a bad father.
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You might have had a bad mother.
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Whatever.
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I'm not saying that everybody has a great authority, but I am saying that God established this authority.
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He establishes the authority of the family.
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And by the way, talking about governmental problems, one of the things that we see in the government that's the most dangerous thing is the destruction of the family.
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Trying to remove the authority of the parents.
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Trying to transfer the authority of the parents over to the government.
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This is a dangerous precedent because the government is not the parents.
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God establishes the parents as the authority in their home, right? And my children live under my authority.
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My wife lives under my authority.
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Now, I seek to be a gracious governor, but I am the governor of my home.
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And she would not be.
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I'd say it with her sitting right here.
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She's not embarrassed to hear that because Mama got a good plan.
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Mama gets taken care of.
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Mama got everything she needs.
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Mama got a man who loves her beyond anything in this world.
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Would live and die for her.
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People would say, well, you're a feminist.
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No, Mama don't want to be a feminist.
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Mama got it good.
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In the sense that she's loved.
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That's what the Bible says.
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Wives submit to your husbands and husbands love your wives.
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As Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.
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That's my job.
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Be a good governor.
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So family is the first sphere of authority.
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The second is the church.
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Christ does establish His church with a certain level of authority in the life of the believer.
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That is why God raises up men called elders and deacons and the body.
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And what are we told to in the Scriptures? We're told to be subject one to another.
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So within the church, we have responsibilities one to another.
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And it says in Hebrews 13, it says that you are to be subject to the authorities in the church.
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That there is actually a position where there is authority.
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Now, again, as an elder, I have to love the people of God not in the same way I love my wife, but in the sense of I have to love them in governing.
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Governing the church.
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Ministering to them.
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Meeting their needs.
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Calling them to account.
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That's the hardest one because people don't respect the authority of the church anymore and they just run off to another church.
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I don't want to be called to account, so I'll just leave this church and go to another church.
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We call that lily pad Christians.
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They just hop from one lily pad to the next.
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They don't want to be subject to any authority.
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They don't want to be subject to the Word of God.
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So that is authority.
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Family, the church.
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And the last one is the state.
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What we would call the government.
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I'll just call it state for simple sake.
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We think of states like 50 states, but I'm saying the governing authority over whatever area you're in.
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If you're in France, you have a different governing authority than if you live in Texas.
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If I had to choose, I love Texas, baby.
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I don't want to live in France.
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But when we live in the state, we live in the United States, so we have a federal government.
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And we live in the state of Florida, we have a state government.
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And we live in a community, a local municipality, which for you guys is Yulee, for me it's Callahan.
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We have a local government.
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And all of those have responsibilities and their responsibility first and foremost is to punish evil and reward good, according to Romans 13.
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Their job is to punish evil and reward good.
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Now does the government always do that? No, we already said they fail.
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So are there times when we have to stand up and say no, that's not right? Yes.
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Are there times when we have to speak out? Yes.
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Now, there does come a question, and I really don't have time to get into it today.
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There does come a question, is there ever a time for conflict? And the question is, well, what about the American Revolution? Was it right or wrong? I tend to stand on the fact that it was right because there was a government here and even though it was lower than the government that was over, it was closer.
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And we talk about proximity.
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Like for us, who's the most important government in my life? You think it's the federal government.
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No, it's not.
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It's the state government.
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And we call that the lesser magistrate.
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So there was a lesser government that was here and a greater government that was elsewhere and the greater government was imposing upon the lesser government and so there was a conflict.
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Can there be righteousness in fighting in that conflict? I think there can be.
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And during the time of the Revolutionary War, there was something called the Black Robe Regiment.
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The Black Robe Regiment was a group of pastors, many of them I believe were Presbyterians, who preached the righteousness of standing against tyranny.
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To defy tyrants is to be subject to God was their statement.
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So is there a time to defy tyrants? Possibly.
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But in general, but in general, we are called to be subject to the government and to do so joyfully, not to be a burden to the government.
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Yes, sir.
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Is it true that our government is particularly ran by the people? I don't mean people, I'm not talking about us as individuals, but people like the Rothschilds and down that line.
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I don't want to get too far into the question of shadow governments because that's sort of what you're talking about is are there people who are behind the government and sort of pulling the strings? I know that, for instance, our government compared to other parts of the world, there's not necessarily a vote, or I know that in the U.S.
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they say that it's ran by the people.
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Okay, but that's, yes, but do you understand what that means? Of the people, for the people, by the people? Do you understand where that comes from, a historical pedigree? That's not talking about the people, the Rothschilds, that's talking about the citizens.
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Of the citizens, for the citizens, and by the citizens.
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That's what that means.
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Whether or not it is that way, that's what that means.
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Huh? Good answer.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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I don't believe that it is that way, but that's what it means, yes.
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That's what that means.
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Yes.
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We the people of the United States, the Constitution begins with that phrase, we the people, the people being the citizens.
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Now again, is there corruption? I think that's without a doubt that there is corruption.
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How far and wide the corruption goes is debatable as to what is happening.
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But again, going back to what is the government, what is the government supposed to do? According to this text, according to Romans 13, it is supposed to reward good and punish evil when it is doing the opposite of that.
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Or, and here's a big one, Isaiah says this, Woe unto them who call evil good and good evil.
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That's the most dangerous thing a government can do, is to invert good and evil.
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Right now, we're told to celebrate things like perversion and sexual promiscuity and homosexuality.
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We're told to celebrate that, but we're told not to celebrate things like Christ and the Gospel.
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Those things have to be eliminated from the public square.
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We can have television shows that encourage our children to learn all about homosexuality, but we can't have shows on network television that tell them that they should trust Christ because that's offensive.
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And see, what we have done is we have inverted good for evil and evil for good.
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There is a lot of corruption.
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Again, not debating that, but the model that our government was set up and supposed to be run under was the model that the people choose their own leaders.
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That's what the government is supposed to be.
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A people of leaders chosen by the people, from the people, for the people.
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And it is corrupt.
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I'm not debating that.
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The purpose and plan of it was good.
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But the corruption is, as I often say, power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
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And that's why it's hard for me to imagine someone in a position of ultimate power that doesn't have some form of corruption.
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Because power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
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Alright.
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I do want to say a couple of real quick things and then we've got to finish.
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Notice what it says.
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It says, beginning in verse 3, it says, For rulers are not a terror to good conduct but to bad.
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Would you have to fear the one who is in authority? Do what is good and you will receive his approval.
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For he is God's servant for your good.
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That's the part that I wanted to mention.
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The word servant is the word diakonos.
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That's the Greek diakonos.
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That is where we get our word deacon or minister.
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People often call me minister because I'm a pastor but technically in Scripture, the ministers were the deacons.
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They were the ministers.
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The pastors were the elders.
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The diakonos in the church is to serve the people.
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Acts chapter 6.
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The people weren't being fed properly so they chose up among them six men of good reputation to do what? To make sure people were served properly.
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They were the servants in the church.
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In my home, I'm a leader but I'm also a servant.
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I serve my family by providing for them and doing what needs to be done.
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So each of these spheres have those who are called ministers or servants.
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The government is supposed to be God's servant to do good.
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So I believe one of the things that the church is called to do in the world and I do it every week is to remind the government that its role is to be God's servant.
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I pray, God, give our leaders a spirit of repentance.
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Break their heart over the anvil of your law and open them up to the reality of their judgment because they will stand before God.
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One day Joe Biden, one day Donald Trump, one day George Bush, one day Hillary Clinton, whoever, not just presidents but governors and everything else, Ron DeSantis and everyone else will stand before God and they will give an account for how they ministered in the position that they were given.
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Just like you will if you're a father or a husband.
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You will stand before God and you will give an account for how you ministered to your family and the authority that you have.
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Thank God for forgiveness, right? Thank God for grace.
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I hope this has helped clarify some things.
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I hope this has pointed out a few things that often we miss.
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We're out of time, so let's pray.
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Father, I thank you for the opportunity to teach.
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And Lord, I do pray that this has been somewhat helpful.
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I know it often raises more questions than it answers, but Lord, I do pray that we would understand that as citizens ultimately of the Kingdom of God, we have a responsibility to be good citizens of the states and governments you've put us in, to not be intentionally rebellious for the purpose of rebellion, but to always be willing to stand on the Word of God even when it is unpopular or even illegal to do so.
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Lord, help us to be subject to the authorities.
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Help us to not hate folks just because they've been placed in a position of authority, but help us to pray for them.
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Your Word tells us in 1 Timothy that we are to pray for kings and those in high authority.
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Pray, Lord, that they would come to know you.
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So I pray today, I pray for our president, I pray for our governor, I pray for our leaders, both in the state and the federal government, Lord, that they would come to know you, that we would have a spirit of repentance that would make its way through our government, and that we would see changes for the good.
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For they are called ministers of the good, and I pray, Lord, that they would recognize that call.
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In Jesus' name, amen.