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Psych and Theo Podcast
Welcome to the "Psych and Theo Podcast". We’re your hosts, Sam and Tim. Join us as we tackle cultural issues by providing insightful discussions from both a theological and psychological perspective.
From celebrity pastors and church controversies to hot-button topics like abortion, gay marriage, and gender identity, we address these issues with grace, humor, knowledge, and wisdom. If you’re looking for thought-provoking conversations on church culture, pop culture, mental health, moral issues, and all things related to the Bible, then you’ve come to the right place.
We do our best to bring our unique perspectives to navigating the complexities of faith and culture through the lens of theology and psychology.
If you’re ready to challenge your thinking and deepen your understanding, then follow us on the "Psych and Theo Podcast." Subscribe now and join the conversation!”
Psych and Theo Podcast
Ep. 30 - Politics and the Christian, Part 1: Unveiling the Sacred Duty of Government
What if governance was always part of the divine plan, even before sin entered the world? Join us as we explore the profound role of government from a Christian perspective, setting the foundation for understanding its purpose through a biblical lens. We'll dissect the complexities of interpreting scripture in political contexts and address the diverse viewpoints among Christians on the relationship between church and state. Dive into listener-submitted topics like shame and the intriguing cultural fascination with spiritual themes, such as the mysterious Nephilim.
We journey through the theological history of human governance, tracing it back to the creation narrative in Genesis. Discover how being created in God's image implies a call to leadership and organization, beyond the implications of sin. Our discussion traverses from the governance roles of Adam and Eve to the justice-focused mission of Noah, to Israel's laws intending to draw nations closer to God. This historical canvas paints a picture of governance as an earthly reflection of divine authority, paving the way for further exploration in the New Testament.
Our conversation then moves to the biblical theology of government, focusing on divine sovereignty amidst the rise and fall of earthly kingdoms, as illustrated in Daniel and Romans. Explore the ordained role of government in preserving justice and restraining evil, and the delicate balance between obedience and civil disobedience as portrayed in Romans 13. We propose further reading for those eager to deepen their understanding, with books like "Politics According to the Bible" by Wayne Grudem and "God and Politics: Four Views on the Reformation and Civil Government." Engage with us as we unravel these complex topics and encourage listener feedback for future episodes.
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All right, everyone, welcome back to the Psych and Theo podcast. We are excited that you're here, and happy that you're here during this very tumultuous season, because it's a political season and, if you've been tuning in, the last couple of episodes have been on a difficult topic of abortion. By this time tomorrow, the release will be on the effects of abortion on mothers, and then we're jumping to this series, which is one on politics, since we're leading up to election day. So today we thought that it would be important to kind of set up the series with establishing the purpose, a view of the purpose of government. Did I say that right? Does that sound about right?
Speaker 2:I think so how the Christians should view the purpose of government.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think so We'll go with that A biblical worldview about government.
Speaker 1:Yes, and what does the Bible have to say about it? We'll talk about what is the purpose of government and so on. We'll answer a couple of questions along the way, but, as always, we thank you for tuning in. We have seen some good growth with the downloads, some good growth just following and views on the page, so we're excited about that. And again we have been receiving comments and messages about hey, here's some topics that we'd like for you to cover, and again we do our best to try to get those because we want to show our gratitude and appreciation for you listening and if you're submitting questions and submitting topics for us to cover, then we want to do that for you guys.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for instance, there's one that we did. We've recorded it. It'll be released in a few weeks on shame.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And the purpose of shame and the role of shame in the Bible and in society, and so just be watching out for that. We're going to release a few of these episodes on politics because of political season yep and then, uh, once we get through political season, christmas season starts so obviously we're going to talk about shame I don't know what that yeah what connects there?
Speaker 1:the reality of santa, yeah, thanksgiving, what's all that?
Speaker 2:so you know yeah, so's all that We'll release some of these episodes. Where am I going with this? My thought train, just like that. One of our listeners submitted a question about shame. We made a whole episode on it. We have other questions that we're going to do episodes on. If you have something that you'd like us to cover, or maybe just something you're wondering about the bible or about psychology, let us know and we'll probably do an episode on it yeah, absolutely if it's on the nephilim.
Speaker 2:No, we're just going to stay away from that one for now that has to be one of the most.
Speaker 1:I mean in person. I'm sure you probably get a lot of questions about oh a ton especially nowadays, because it's all over the internet and people are.
Speaker 2:I don't know why it's like our, our, why it's such an explosion right now and interest in the nephilim in genesis.
Speaker 1:6 did it surprise? I have some episode do. What did it surprise you when we released that episode, that you'd get so many questions about it?
Speaker 2:no, because it's all over like there's. It seems like there's uh, an interest in spiritualism these days and a focus on the occult and the demonic and all that stuff, and so with that comes theories about the nephilim, okay, and all that. So, uh, anyway, yeah, now that's a, that's a big tangent from our episode so right, right, well, we'll jump into our topic right now.
Speaker 1:But, yeah, thank you for listening Again, share the episodes, leave a rating, leave a review, and we greatly appreciate that. All right, so, tim, we're talking about the role of government here and wanting to know what the Bible has to say about it. We're doing a series, so we'll talk about the psychology of politics. We're even going to jump into economics in a later episode, but today we want to know what the role of government is and how Christians should view it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. So this might surprise you, but there are lots of opinions about this, all right, so there's lots and lots of views on it. Sam, I was expecting you to laugh at that point. I know what you're. Come on, you gotta laugh at these jokes, man. You gotta laugh at them, okay, yeah, so there's lots of different views, just by Christians, on the role and purpose of government, the scope of the government's authority and its relation to the church. So there's a variety of different views. I'll have some books at the end I can recommend to our audience, but I want to walk through what is the primary and then the secondary purpose of government. So this will be a really basic overview. If you're looking for a treatise on government, like John Locke's Two Treatises or something, go somewhere else. Or if you're looking for the Declaration of Independence or something like, go somewhere else. It's not here All right.
Speaker 1:Or if you're looking for the Declaration of Independence, sorry that was already written.
Speaker 2:Go read that somewhere else. Read it, yeah, but do like and subscribe to our channel before you do. All right, so the Bible, you know, when it comes to the purpose of government, when Christians approach the Bible, like, like all things, they are tempted to prove text. They're tempted to pull out verses from the old and the new testament and to directly apply those to modern day politics, as though there's not like two that at least two thousand years of history in between, or more. A good example of this would be the verse in 2 Chronicles. I think it's 2 Chronicles 7.14, if I remember correctly. We all know the verse.
Speaker 2:It says if my people, which are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and will heal their land, and that is quoted all the time by American Christians as though that's just a promise and a covenant that God gave to everyone. But the problem is that is read within the context of Solomon dedicating the temple or when the temple is built. It's out of Solomon, of the high priest, that says that it's a reminder of God's covenant with Israel about how he will restore the land. That's a really important word. He's like I will heal their land, the land of Canaan, the land of Israel, is a really important part of the promise that God has to the Jews. Okay, so that verse, we can't just quote it as though it applies to us, as though man, if all the Christians, if we just pray and we get on our knees and we pray for America, that God's going to heal our land and make it great again, or something like that. Right, okay, that's a misappropriation, a misapplication of that verse. Now, does that mean that God doesn't care about America? No, it doesn't mean that. Does that mean that God doesn't hear prayer? No, it doesn't mean that. Does that mean that if all of us Christians, if we pray for our country, that God's not going to help us heal our country. No, it doesn't mean that. I mean all those things could be true. But we can't just slap that verse onto what we're doing and say, oh see, god promised that he'll heal our land. That's not necessarily the case. Okay, god might have other plans and here's an example of this.
Speaker 2:Christians often talk out both sides of their mouth on this issue, especially dispensational premillennials. That gets into eschatology a little bit. But those who believe in the pre-tribulation raptor I would like to see a pre-tribulation raptor. Actually, I wonder what that looks like. The pre-tribulation rapture and then the thousand-year millennial reign.
Speaker 2:Oftentimes, when they're dealing with prophecy and trying to decipher what revelation means and they're coming up with prophecy charts and all that stuff, they'll make this conspicuous observation that doesn't look like America is in revelation, doesn't look like America is in the end times. It doesn't look like america is in revelation, doesn't look like america is in the end times. It doesn't look like america is really plays a prominent role in what's going on in the end times apocalypse, okay. And they conclude from that that, well, maybe something happened to america, you know, maybe america's gotta be destroyed or something like that.
Speaker 2:But oftentimes these same groups of Christians pray as though, oh, we got to save America, like pray and God will save America, but they'll talk about how we're living in the end times and America doesn't really have a prominent place in the end times. You see my point. So let's just be careful not to read into the scriptures and apply those things directly to America. There are things we can apply apply. So those of you who are about to jump down my throat right now there are things we can apply, but we just got to be careful not to proof text yeah, okay, and I've often wondered about that too, tim, like why do people do that?
Speaker 1:and I feel like, for the most part, they're trying to give themselves, you know, a sense of hope, maybe. Or is it, or maybe just being taught the bible wrongly, because, to your point, a lot of christians do do that. They'll grab a verse. You know they did that with the, you know assassination attempt on trump. Remember when they were oh, man, oh yeah like all these misapplications and against your point.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was, it was it was. Well, it wasn't. It wasn't shameful that christian, like some like laity christians you know were were Christians were buying into it. It was shameful that pastors who should know better were doing that. That was very shameful.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's the same kind of principle here, where they're grabbing this passage and wanting to apply it to America. But yeah, I don't. I can dig into that a little bit deeper, but I wonder your thoughts on that. Why do you think Christians often misapply passages like that?
Speaker 2:Well, if you remember our episode on hermeneutics, a lot of times they just don't know that they're doing that. They don't know that that's a problem. They aren't necessarily aware of the proper way to interpret Scripture, and this is a perennial problem, you know, in the church.
Speaker 1:for thousands of years. It's always been an issue.
Speaker 2:Yeah, people have been doing this, you know. Another verse is Micah 6, 8,. You know, to love, act, just love mercy, act justly and walk humbly before your God or love justice. I'm paraphrasing right now. I'm blanking on how the verse actually goes, but Micah 6, 8 is what does the Lord require of you? To love justice, anyway you know what? I mean Joe Biden. You know the thing.
Speaker 2:I'll say it that way I don't have it pulled up. It's crazy. I can quote these verses anytime because I'm just talking, but you put a microphone in front of me and I'm just like an idiot. I'm a total buffoon.
Speaker 1:Mike is going to say here we go. He has told you, oh man, what is good and what does the Lord require of you? But do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God. But there's a question mark at the end there. I don't know if that's part of the actual passage, but it's walk humbly with your God.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So people often quote that as though that is a very clear application to, or that's a very clear principle that we need to apply to the government. And usually the application to that is well, love, mercy and act with justice, oh, we need to enact compassionate policies of economic redistribution or other things like that. That's usually how that goes. Or like we need to open our borders and let all the immigrants come in. All that stuff Just really lazy kind of applications for that passage. But people will pull that one too. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Okay, so let's get into this a little bit. Let me give you the primary function of government first. Now we don't have time to go through a whole biblical theology here of government, but let's understand some of human history as the Bible presents it. Theological history Okay, so, human beings this is Genesis 1 and 2, human beings are created to have dominion on the earth. They're created in the image of God to have dominion on the earth. Okay, that is their purpose and function on the earth. They are to govern the earth as God's image, as God's steward on this earth.
Speaker 2:Sometimes, people often will ask would there be any government if we hadn't sinned? And the answer is actually yes, because human beings have to go out. Shocker, this might shock some of you, but the garden of eden was perfect, but the whole world is not perfect. It's called very good but it's not called perfect, okay, uh, so there's indications in the text that the the world itself was a little bit wild, or at least it needed some improvement. Human beings were to actually go out and and essentially expand the Garden of Eden all over the world. That requires organization and cooperation and leadership, all the things that human beings naturally form themselves into when they get into communities Now, it would have been much more effective and efficient and probably nice without sin. But human nature like human nature, if we follow the biblical anthropology indicates that government, like governing things, is what humans do. So the purpose of government at the very beginning is to steward the earth in some way. Now, hang on, people. I know when I say that some environmentalists are going to jump all over that no hang on.
Speaker 2:essentially, human beings are to rule on the earth, rule over creation okay, uh so. But sin enters the the picture and sin messes everything up. Mankind gets kicked out of the garden. Death comes from sin, man's ability.
Speaker 2:The curse on Adam is a curse that the ground will not yield its fruit as easily. Man is going to work by the sweat of his brow. It's going to be basically really hard for him to do the things he's meant to do. So it's going to be really hard for him to subdue the earth and to have dominion, even though he still is given dominion on the earth. It's going to be much harder because of sin and Eve.
Speaker 2:Part of her curse is that, or the consequences of the punishment for sin is that the relationship between man and woman is going to be much more hostile. It's not completely hostile, but there's going to be some struggle there too. So there's going to be human division comes right in and then ultimately, with the serpent, the curse, human beings are going to vie with evil, spiritual evil in this world and ultimately Christ is going to defeat that. But fast forward human beings are still meant to go out and have dominion on the earth, build things, organize themselves and do all that represent God on the earth. We see this covenant reinstituted in Genesis 9 with Noah, when he gets off the flood, off the flood, off the ark after the flood, god reinstitutes this command to go out, multiply and fill the earth.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, same thing. And he also adds to that don't kill anyone. So he adds to that the punishments for murder and other things. So, right there you see, like it's a responsibility of humankind now to punish, um, those who would, those who would commit murder against other people, those who would do violence against other people, and that that has allusions to what was happening before the flood. It was great violence and wickedness on the earth.
Speaker 2:So god is now basically clarifying for noah, since you guys didn't get it right the first time here, here is what's happening. So, uh, there again. You see these inklings. Oh, this is a function of human beings.
Speaker 2:We now have the responsibility to punish certain kinds of evil maybe not all kinds of evil and sin, but certain kinds of a particular nature, and you can point to maybe violence is one of those. Something that's of a violent nature Human beings have a responsibility to punish in order so that it doesn't spread across the whole earth and destroy people. Because, think about it, if a society had legalized murder, what kind of society would that be? It would be quite dysfunctional. Every society has some understanding of just and unjust killings. Now, we might disagree, societies might disagree on what equates to a just or unjust killing, but all of us have that innate understanding, that framework in our minds.
Speaker 1:Or even just or unjust punishment for those things.
Speaker 2:Yep, yep, yep. Okay, so I need to speed up a little bit. Let's jump forward, because when we get into the story of Israel and the law, it gets a little bit more complicated, because not everything that God gives to Israel is applicable to the nations. Even though Israel is meant to be a light to the nations and how they organized and governed themselves, what they were ultimately meant to do is bring the nations back into true worship with God. They weren't necessarily meant to show the nations how to organize their cleanliness laws and things like that. There's not an indication that that's what the function of Israel's law was it was to bring them back to God.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like Israel's supposed to be a light to the nations, to bring the nations back to true worship to God. You remember when we were talking about the spiritual warfare episodes and how, at the Tower of Babel, god disinherits? The nations.
Speaker 2:And Deuteronomy 32 says that these nations then went and worshipped demons, other gods. So Israel, they are set up as God's true people, the ones who worship the true God, and they are meant to point people back to him. So God sanctifies this people of Israel to point the other nations back to him, much like he sanctifies Christians now to point people to Christ. So I don't want to get bogged down into what parts of the Old Testament law are applicable to societies or not. Let's jump all the way forward to the New Testament real quick. Actually, before I do that, let me give a few other examples here.
Speaker 2:The primary function, then, of government is to human. Government is a representation of God's rule over the earth. So God sovereignly rules all of creation. We see many, many instances of that throughout the Bible, where God sets up and he throws down kings and empires Acts 17,. Paul says he determines the times and the boundaries of people in their dwellings. That's an allusion back to the Tower of Babel, god. The vision in Daniel 2 of the statue that Nebuchadnezzar sees, of the gold head and the silver chest and arms. That statue is all these empires that rise against God's kingdom, but God's kingdom ultimately wins. In Daniel 4,. When he sees his kingdom is spread over all the earth, he gets cut down and humbled so that he will recognize that. God is the one who rules over the nations.
Speaker 2:Even when Israel goes into captivity, they are reminded by the prophets again and again and again You're not in captivity because God lost control. You're in captivity because of your sin and idolatry, but God is still in control. He's always on his throne, and he raised up Nebuchadnezzar, he raised up Cyrus, he raised up all the other kingdoms, and he's ultimately in control. Nothing is outside of his control. So if a portion of that, what we might call divine sovereignty, a portion of that is given to human beings to have earthly sovereignty, sovereignty over the earth in some way, sovereignty over their communities and their organizations, this is the biblical theology of government. So, in its most basic function, then, is to preserve God's righteousness or justice on the earth. Now, how does a government do that? The clearest example of this is Romans 13, 1 through 7. So that's what I want to read to you, one of the feedbacks we got, or I got recently from a faithful listener. He'll know who he is.
Speaker 2:He texted me and said one recommendation I would make is that you read the passages, because a lot of people are driving, they can't look up their Bibles and I'm just like whizzing through these Bible references. Anyway.
Speaker 1:No, that's good. So let me read this for you, we're listening to you, people.
Speaker 2:Romans 13, 1-7. Let every soul Now this is Paul speaking to the Roman church Let every soul now this is Paul speaking to the Roman church let every soul be subject unto the higher powers, that is, the governing powers. There is no power but of God, and the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever, therefore, resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God, and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation, for rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Wilt thou, then, not be afraid of the power. Do that which is good, and thou shalt.
Speaker 2:I realize I'm reading the King James Version, a throwback to my old school days. So, the rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Wilt thou not be afraid of the power. Do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same, for he is a minister that is the government. He is a minister of God to thee for good.
Speaker 2:But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid, for he beareth not the sword in vain, for he is a minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil, wherefore ye must needs be subject. In other words, you should be subject, Not simply for wrath's sake, that is, you know, for the wrath because of the wrath of the government, but also for your own conscience, but also for conscience' sake. For this cause you pay tribute or taxes, and also for they also, that is, the government, for they are God's ministers, attending continually upon this very thing. Render, therefore, to all their duties. Tribute to whom tribute is due, custom to whom custom, fear to whom fear. Honor to whom honor. Okay, that's romans 13, 1 through 7 and the kjv.
Speaker 1:It's free from the the true version yeah, so um.
Speaker 2:So, uh, did you know?
Speaker 1:I actually grew up kjv, only me too yeah, we moved to newke and KJV a little bit later.
Speaker 2:I have some people back home in Ohio who are from my home church. My home church is very dear to my heart. Do they still use it? Yeah, they still use KJV. Oh, wow so yeah, I grew up on that.
Speaker 1:So it took you back. Yeah, it took me back A little flashback moment, same here, so it took you back.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it took me back A little flashback moment, same here, yeah, okay, so this is the passage that typically theologians will go to to try to exegete and determine what's the proper role of government. I wrote an article about this about a year ago, summarizing this passage and in general there's two basic functions of government that you see in this passage. The first is to restrain evil. Okay, uh, it's to restrain evil by punishing evildoers, but evildoers, you have to understand that within its context. Some people will read this passage and say, well, the government's responsible to punish evil, and they will read evil as though there's no implied limits on that.
Speaker 2:Some people will read this and think, oh, the government can punish any evil, that the text places no limits on the government in this passage. So that's one of the mistakes I see is over-reading, like reading into the text more than what's there. Because if we get into this a little bit, you'll see that there's an implied limit or an implied focus on what evil means here. But basically, governments are to restrain evil. In other words, they're to uphold a basic and universal moral law by restraining the evil impulses within human society. Now, do you remember when I was talking about genesis 9, like capital punishment? You know topic? Think of romans 13 in this context. Okay, so first the government says he bears a sword yeah all right, that is an allusion to the ability to kill.
Speaker 2:Yeah. The authority to kill, because a sword is not something you spank people with, it's something you kill people with. Okay, so when the government bears the sword, or they put them to the sword, we all know what they mean, you know. So that is. That is a reference to the government's authority to give capital punishment when necessary. Okay, so when does the government give capital punishment just for any offense? Of course not, that would be crazy you know.
Speaker 2:So let's understand Romans 13, 1 through 7 in its context. But that's a basic function. We understand that directly from the passage. The government is an avenger, he's a minister. It says he's a basic function. We understood stand that directly from the passage. The government is an, a is an avenger, he's a, he's a minister says he's a minister. I think the greek word behind that is diakonos, which is where we get the word deacon, you know you know, uh, for servants in the church.
Speaker 2:In the same way, the government is a servant of god in civil society To restrain evil. Now Paul is telling Christians this within a letter. He's not just like tweeting this out to the church in Rome, okay. Romans 13 follows a long argument that Paul is making. Paul has walked them through salvation, that all are condemned and need Jesus as their Savior. Salvation is by grace, through faith in Him, all the way back from Abraham until now and those who are saved. We have a new nature. We're not a slave to sin. We have the Spirit and we can rejoice in that. We have the promises of God and then even Israel God ultimately has a purpose for them in the end too that have the promises of God and then even Israel will have. God ultimately has a purpose for them in the end too. That's Romans 9 through 11. When he gets to Romans 12, he starts giving applications to the church, like kind of life applications based on all the things he's taught.
Speaker 2:And at the end of Romans 12, he is telling the Christians do not, when someone does evil against you, like when someone is doing something wrong to you, don't seek revenge. This is that famous verse that we all quote vengeance is mine saith the Lord Paul quotes that here. It's in the Old Testament and he quotes it here as well. He says to them don't return, don't repay evil for evil, but repay evil with good. Okay, so he's talking to Christians. He says don, but repay evil with good. Okay, so he's talking to Christians. You repay evil with good and you do that in various ways. But if you do that, you will heap coals of fire on that person's head. Meaning it's kind of an obscure reference, but it basically means you will basically heap embarrassment upon them.
Speaker 2:You will basically keep embarrassment upon them, because if they're doing evil to you and you keep doing good to them, most people, because of the image of God within them, will look at that and be like something's up here, like something's.
Speaker 1:It's not clicking. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay. So Paul gets done telling Christians do not seek vengeance for yourself. And then he goes to Romans 13, and he says therefore, be subject to the governing authorities, for they are ministers of God to do what? To execute justice on evil doers. And then he goes on to say therefore, be subject to them, for they do not bear the sword in vain. And so Paul wants believers not to take vengeance into their own hands, but to leave that to the instrument God has already put on the earth, that is, the government. The governing authorities have that function of bringing about punishment and justice on someone who would do evil against them yeah, okay, that's tough tim.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so that's but you have to understand when paul is talking about the government being an avenger. Yeah, you have to understand that in the context of romans 12, sure, sure, christians are not avengers of their own wrongdoings. God will use other means, and one of the means he uses is the government. So if the government is the means by which God brings about vengeance on people who do evil, what does that tell us about? Maybe the scope and limits of what the government ought to do? Okay, so I'll just kind of let people kind of sit with that for a minute. That does imply a few things about what the government is supposed to do, but in a basic sense, that primary function is that the government restrains evil. It restrains those evil impulses. So, like in the Roman Empire, if someone hurled an insult at a Christian, that wouldn't raise any eyebrows. The Roman government's not going to care about that. But if someone is stealing from Christians, if someone is abusing Christians, if someone is doing violence, maybe even killing Christians Now, the Roman government did that themselves, on their own authority. But if someone were doing like in this context, there's a lot of fighting between Jews and Christians and the Jews often would try to do things, evil things to Christians and the Jews often would try to do things, evil things to Christians. And all this seems to be saying that if someone is doing that kind of evil to you, that's the government's function to come in and stop that. And we see instances of that in Acts, where Paul's opponents are coming against him and then he appeals to Caesar or the Romans have to rescue Paul and get him out of danger, and things like that. So that should inform us about what Paul is saying here.
Speaker 2:Some people will read this passage and again they'll overread it and they'll say well, look, paul's saying be subject unto the governing authorities. Therefore, there's no room for civil disobedience. There's room for any, any form of disobeying the government. And again, that's over reading the text, because paul's not giving a full treatise on government. Here he's. He's trying to get the christians to see something and that's you don't want to be. He's telling the christians you don't want to be seen as social revolutionaries that are taking the law into your own hands. True, because that's what something happened right before he wrote this letter. In Rome and to Rome. There was an uprising. It was a Jewish uprising in the city of Rome in the 50s AD, maybe in the 40s AD, and so this was very and Rome had to put it down AD. And so this was very and Rome had to put it down.
Speaker 1:So this was very much on the forefront of the mind of Paul and the Christians in that city. Yeah, I knew that question was going to come up. The idea of civil disobedience because I think that's the number one reason that Christians will bring up is like, well, only if, or they can't cross this line here, so where do we draw that line? I don't know if that's true line here, so where do we draw that line? I don't know if that's true. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Maybe we can do another episode on civil disobedience itself, because there's different degrees of that in different contexts. But it would be a mistake to just read this passage and say that there's no room for civil disobedience. That would be again over-reading into the text again over reading into the text.
Speaker 1:Would it be fair to say then at least for from what you read in romans that because the role of gomorrah is to punish evil, and evil from, from the context seems to be when you are hurting or killing someone else, or is there more attached to it?
Speaker 2:in my opinion that is implied okay, that it seems to be the kind of evil that would bring about social disorder and chaos okay, yeah, so it could.
Speaker 1:It does include that, but it could include some other things as well yeah, I don't.
Speaker 2:It certainly doesn't seem to include all forms of sin or evil that's not what the passage is saying. Okay, what it seems to be saying is that the government is responsible to maintain order in society, and some people will take that and run amok with it all the way to the point of almost totalitarianism. That would be an overextension of what the government is supposed to do here.
Speaker 1:Was the government at that time doing that?
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, the Roman government is, but Paul's not justifying everything that the Roman government is doing. It's true.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he's not saying that. What he is saying is that Christians need to be subject to the government, because our primary purpose is to get people saved, is to witness to them and just share the gospel with them and to get them to hear and hopefully believe in the gospel and to be a good witness in society. If we're getting caught up in social revolutions and trying to overthrow the government, the government's not really going to like Christianity all that much. So Paul is really concerned about that. Christians in their day there wasn't much of a concept of civil disobedience where they're going to walk in the street and protest and go vote the emperor out. That just was not the case. There are instances in the Bible of people disobeying governments for the right reasons, but again, I don't want to get sidetracked into civil disobedience.
Speaker 2:But yeah, essentially the primary function of a government is a negative function.
Speaker 2:If you want to boil this down it's a negative function and that negative function is to restrain evil. Some people will take this, take a secondary, what I would call a secondary function of government, and make it equal with that primary function. The secondary function is the promotion of the good, or to promote the good. We see this also in romans 13, um. So if you look at verse 4 it says for he is, I'm going to switch to like the niv or something real quick, sure, um just not the message.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I won't go to the nasby, the nasby real quick here my internet will so the second rule of government is promoting the good yeah, yeah. So uh, I'll pick it up. In verse three it says four rulers are not a cause for fear, are not a cause of fear for good behavior, but for evil. So in other words, they cause fear, uh, in people's hearts who do evil, like if, if you do good, the government is not they can be worried about you, yeah the government's not going to be worried if you're doing good, or at least it shouldn't be worried if you're doing good.
Speaker 2:So he says do you want to have fear of the authority or do you not want to have fear of the authority? Then do what is good and you will have praise of the same. So if you do what's good, the government will praise you Okay, verse 4, for it. That is, the government is a servant of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid, for it. That is, the government does not bear the sword for nothing.
Speaker 2:For it is a servant of God, an avenger, who brings wrath on the one who practices evil. So sometimes people will read this and think that there is a dual role, dual purpose of government, as though these two functions are equal. Dual role, dual purpose of government, as though these two functions are equal. I do think there's two functions here, but one is primary and one is secondary to that. The primary is to restrain evil, because the government walks around carrying the sword. It's an instrument of violence, it's an avenger. Government is a servant in the sense that it is an avenger on evil. The secondary function then is the promotion of good, but that secondary function is a result of its primary function. When the government is performing its primary function properly, then the secondary function follows. That is, the promotion of good, okay, so yeah.
Speaker 2:So paul says the the purpose of a government is to instill fear in people who do evil, that is, people who really do evil Thievery, murder, violence, rape, all those things, okay, assault. The government's purpose is to instill fear in those people, not fear in someone who takes care of their family, runs their business properly, uh, goes to church on sunday, uh, is a good, responsible, upstanding member of their society, runs a non-profit, you know all those things. Okay, a law-abiding citizen. The government doesn't, shouldn't, instill fear in those people. If the government is instilling fear in those people, if the government is instilling fear in those people, the government is doing something very wrong. It's extending, it has in some way exceeded its authority and in that excess of its authority, it's creating fear in good people. Yeah, okay, that should give you an indication of when the government is actually too big, if you're afraid of things that you're doing good and the government has coming in and has the authority to punish you in some way or to hurt you.
Speaker 1:Right, okay, has an adverse effect. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So when a government, though, is punishing evil properly, the inverse effect of that is the promotion of good. People will say oh, I don't want to be afraid of getting my head chopped off, maybe I'll obey the law, like I don't want to be afraid of going to prison, maybe I'll obey the law. So when the government is actually an effective punisher of that kind of crime, it will promote a good and ordered society. We can see this throughout the world and throughout different cities in the United States, when there are let's just take city governments, for instance throughout the United States I won't name any specifically, but we all have some in mind where the city government or the state government has made laws against crime really, really lax, and it's created social chaos, absolute social chaos. Okay, we know other states that have almost gone in the opposite direction and have said no nonsense on this stuff.
Speaker 2:We're going to come down hard on people who steal, on people who commit murder, on people who commit violence. We're going to come down really hard on you. The effect of that is that good people want to go to places where their good is rewarded and not punished. Good people want to go to places where they don't fear criminals yeah because the criminals fear the government right, right, right. You see that that makes sense.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that is. That's why that secondary, the secondary purpose or secondary function of government, and that, in the promotion of what is good, only follows when the government is doing its primary function well.
Speaker 1:That was my question. I was going to ask why. What's the issue with elevating? Because you said some people are going to elevate the secondary function to be equal with the primary.
Speaker 2:Some people will elevate the doing of the doing good of the government to of equal importance with punishing evil, and then they will, they will extend, they will apply or extend out that application to saying, well, the government can do lots of good in society. Do you see where this is going?
Speaker 2:okay, okay the government has a really good role to play in society. It can do all kinds of good. So let's have social programs, let's have, like, look at all the good things the government can do. Okay, so it takes this primary negative function. The government is an instrument of violence. It takes that primary negative function the government is an instrument of violence. It takes that primary negative function and it flips it on its head and says, well, the government can be like effective at doing good things too, that's. But that's not what the passage is saying.
Speaker 1:Okay okay, yeah, when you mentioned promoting good, I also thought you meant I guess that they would encourage well, I guess it may fall into encourage good behavior among the people.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, so it is part of that yeah, good behavior in the people, right, but when? When a government like a government, wants its citizens to obey the law. Once a government wants its citizens to act properly, it doesn't you know if a government is functioning properly. It doesn't want to like just throw random citizens in jail yeah so there are some governments who do want to do that.
Speaker 2:So when it says if you do good, you will receive praise from the government, it's saying if you obey the law, the government is going to say, look, this is a just person, this is a righteous person. In the law's eyes, this is an innocent person. Yeah, yeah, you have to understand the doing of the good within the context of the government instilling fear in evildoers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm really glad you made that distinction that that is the primary, because it does set up well for the second piece. That's good. So when?
Speaker 2:it says at the end for this reason you pay your taxes. You extend honor to whom honor is due, custom to whom custom is due, respect to whom respect is due. Paul's saying look, as Christians, we don't want to be seen as rabble-rousing revolutionaries, because our purpose, like we, have to be good witnesses. The church has to be a good witness in society. We we need to be seen by the government as good, law-abiding, innocent people who who work for the the good of society.
Speaker 2:That's our primary function. Now again, like, history is complicated, so the government can go wrong. Uh, non-christian groups can go wrong. Christians and the church can do things wrong, so we have to be careful in how we apply Romans 13, 1 through 7. But it gives us a basic framework for understanding what is the nature of a government itself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's good. Well, Tim, I have a lot of other questions, but we'll get into that a little bit later. Yeah, I guess what was the following or the next point there?
Speaker 2:Well, I'll just wrap it up with this. So the primary function restrain evil. Secondary function is to promote the good by restraining evil, because, again, sin enters the world. God gives the responsibility of human beings to restrain evil, and particularly in Genesis 9, restraining that really violent side of evil. So we understand that then the government is a reflection Now this is not like all governments, but government as a concept is a reflection of God's authority over the earth, and so government is a reflection of that within human society and, specifically, in restraining the kind of evil that humans would do, it serves God in that way, or it ought to serve God in that way, by restraining evil. So that's a general obligation that a government has to its people and to God.
Speaker 2:So with that, though, christians, we have this gospel-centered reason to support the government, and we don't have time to get into this, but sorry for not reading this passage but 1 Peter, 2, 13 through 16,. Peter echoes what Paul says in Romans 13, but he says basically, you want to be people who are good, so render unto Caesar taxes and honor and respect. He sort of repeats the same lines that Paul does, but for the reason that we want to get the gospel out into the world. Okay, we need to be seen as people who are doing that. So our primary role, then, is to take the gospel to the world. So we don't take the law into our own hands, we don't seek vengeance on people. I know comic books are cool and we love, a good vigilante story.
Speaker 2:I'm as guilty as the next guy. We're loving those kind of stories, okay, but at the end of the day, as Christians we have to submit to God's authority in this and call upon the government to punish evil. So I would say just in closing with that that that's the government's primary and secondary function and our our role in that is to take the gospel to the world and to encourage governments to fulfill their primary purpose, because that helps us fulfill our purpose.
Speaker 1:No, it's good, and I do just have to ask this this question because I think you know, considering the topic and kind of where you took us in describing the role of government. He says so our primary responsibility as Christians is to push forth the gospel. I think the question that a lot of Christians are going to have is what is so, now that you explained the role of government, should I be involved or should I have some say in politics, like what is the role of a Christian in today's modern government?
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, so that gets into the question of political engagement and maybe the ethics of even like political involvement. Okay, let me just I'll just recommend a few books then to get into that. That would kind of dovetail into a different conversation A couple of books.
Speaker 2:One is called Politics According to the Bible by Wayne Grudem. This is not. Grudem is a scholar, he's a theologian, and this is meant to be more of a like a systematic approach to politics approach to politics. So it's not deep, but it is really, really a good resource on different topics. So he's done a really good job of just distilling down the basic principles of politics according to the Bible. Now, I'm not going to agree with everything Grudem says here. Maybe you won't either, but it's a good resource, okay. So that's another one. One that I actually use in my ethics class is called walking in the ways of wisdom, an introduction to biblical ethics, by robertson mcquilkin and paul copan, and they actually have a chapter toward the end of the book on church and state and then political engagement. So that's a good ethics book to get as well. The one that's a good one for just debating about this topic is called God and Politics Four Views on the Reformation and Civil Government.
Speaker 2:Now we might have some Catholics listening.
Speaker 2:Sorry, catholics if I excluded you there, Catholics, I excluded you there. But if you take any sort of Protestant view of the Bible, these four views are going to be theonomy, which is like. Theonomy means God's law. It's typically people who want to apply directly or mostly directly, some form of the Mosaic law to modern society in some way. We don't have to get into the details of law to modern society in some way. We don't have to get into the details of that. But theonomy is one. Principled pluralism is another, one. That would be sort of what we see today in our culture Christian America. Again, there's a big strand in our country that are in that group and then national confessionalism, which is like a state that identifies as Christian and says I'm a Christian country. It's in my laws and things like that.
Speaker 2:So those are the four views and it's a good book. God and Politics Four Views on the Reformation and Civil Government. So what this does is each author there's four authors that take one of these positions, and then they'll write their argument and then the other three respond to them. That's typically how these interesting four views books go, but it's a good resource it's cool yeah, good stuff, all right.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you for sharing about the role of government and giving that background and, uh, I get, I feel like we're gonna get a lot of questions on these three, uh, these next episodes. But, um, yeah, send in your questions, we'll answer them. It could be an episode might just be over instagram or um, we'll start doing some little videos responding to them. We'll see how we work it out. But, guys, thank you for tuning in. We will talk to you next time.
