Romans 13:1: “Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God.”

May 8th, 2022 by Pastor Ed in devotional

When Paul says “every soul,” he is certainly including believers. Paul said that everyone should be subject to the governing authorities; this was in contrast to the idea of 1st-century, zealous Jews who recognized no king but God and paid taxes to no one but God. Scripture makes one exception to this command to be subject to the governing authorities, and that is when obedience to civil authority requires disobedience to God’s word. Peter gave us an example of this exception in Acts 5:29, when he said to the authorities that were commanding him to stop preaching the gospel, “We ought to obey God rather than man.” In Acts 9:25, Paul himself was let down over the wall in Damascus by the disciples to avoid the authorities. We must obey the lower authority until it requires disobedience to the highest authority, God Almighty.

When the laws of man conflict with the word of God, then it is the Lord who holds our final loyalty. Yet even then, even when we are forced by necessity to violate the law of man, we are still to maintain a heart of submission to those in authority. We find this principle in the familiar Old Testament story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego in Daniel 2. They practiced civil disobedience when a golden idol was set up on the plain of Dura and citizens of Babylon were required to worship it. When the band played, everyone was to bow down before the image, and everyone did except 3 young guys. They willingly submitted to the punishment (being thrown in a fiery furnace) for refusing to worship the idol. They said they wouldn’t bow and that their God was powerful enough to save them from the furnace if He chose to, but even if He chose not to, they would not disobey His word. What might God ask you to do in service of Him? Today believers smuggle Bibles into closed countries and often meet with brothers and sisters in secret to encourage them.

“LORD, please help us today to say along with Isaiah of old, ‘Here am I LORD, send me!'”