God’s Secular Ministers

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Turn with me to Romans chapter 13, if you would please. We’ll be in this passage this morning and tonight, two different messages on the same passage, because the beginning of Romans chapter 13 is essentially, I like to look at it as a coin, which is fitting because it talks in verse 7 about rendering tribute to Caesar, and tribute being coins and the taxes that they would pay. Romans 13 we can look at as being a coin with two sides to it.

And on one side, we see our responsibilities. Most readily, we see our responsibility toward those in authority over us. And that’s what’s typically talked about when we look at Romans chapter 13.

And that’s what we’ll talk about tonight, is our responsibility toward those that God has placed in authority over us. This morning, we look at the other side of the coin, though. Maybe what’s not quite so evident, but we can see in between the lines here, the responsibilities of those in authority over us toward us.

You know, they have responsibilities toward us. Now, ultimately, it’s God who holds them accountable. We live in an incredible system.

It’s not perfect by any stretch, but we live in an incredible system that’s unique in history, not that we’re the only ones who have it, but it just really, to the modern age, is unique. Throughout history, people had very little choice over who their rulers would be. We have an incredible opportunity living in the United States and in other countries today where they have this right.

We have an incredible opportunity to be a part of choosing our leaders. You may be thinking now, oh, great, he’s going to talk about politics. Yes, I am a little bit.

I don’t normally preach about politics, which is hard because, as you probably know, I’m a political junkie or a recovering political junkie. And I told you shortly after coming here that as much as I enjoy preaching, my plans were never to go into full-time ministry. I enjoyed preaching, but my plans were to go into politics and be the governor of Oklahoma.

That’s going to be a little hard to do from here. So I had to put that aside when God called me over here. I love politics, but it’s not the most important thing.

That’s why I don’t preach on it too much. It is important, but it’s not the most important thing. As a matter of fact, I want to read something to you, especially if you’re new here, so you don’t think that, oh great, every time I go to church, they’re talking about politics.

This is the first time I’ve ever preached on it here. It will probably be the last for a little while. I found an article, just a brief article, last night in the Christian Post, and I don’t know anything about the man who wrote this.

He could be completely off in his theology, but I thought the point of the article was good and I thought was well taken. It’s called Ten Reasons Why Christians Should Focus More on the Gospel Than on Politics. Number one, politics change, the gospel doesn’t.

Amen? Anybody? You don’t have to amen on all of these, but it’s a good point to start out with.

Politics change, the gospel doesn’t. Number two, the gospel will transform our politics, not vice versa. Politics can’t transform people for the gospel, but the gospel can transform our politics.

Number three, it’s what Jesus calls us to do, the gospel, the Great Commission, not politics. Number four, we are citizens of a different kingdom. Number five, it’s what the early church focused on, the gospel.

And by the way, after each of these, there’s a scripture citation. I’ll hang this up on the bulletin board later so you can look these up if you’d like to. Number six, it attacks the root of evil and not just the fruit of it.

Amen. That convicted me a few years ago because I noticed I was spending all my time on politics and trying to force people outwardly to act right instead of focusing on the gospel that attacks the heart of the problem. Number seven, politics can divide the body of Christ while the gospel will unite us.

Number eight, the gospel calls us to pray for politicians we agree with, not hate them. Ouch. That’s hard to do, but we’re called to do it anyway.

Number nine, the gospel brings political action soaked in love and humility, not pride and arrogance. In other words, if we’re focused on the gospel, If we’re focused on going about God’s work, when we do wade into the realm of politics, we’re going to keep in the back of our minds that these are not enemies on the other side. These are souls that Christ died for, and they need the gospel just as much as anything.

And it’ll bring us into the political realm when we need to venture there with love and grace and humility toward other people. And number 10, politics are a reflection of the moral compass of society. Our politics are driven by where our society is morally.

The gospel gives the society a new compass that’s accurate. And he says here, my point is not that we should avoid politics as Christians, but that we should focus more on the gospel. I agree wholeheartedly.

I hope you do too. That’s why I don’t preach a whole lot on politics, and believe me, I could. You wouldn’t want me to.

I’d make half of you mad one Sunday and the other half mad the next. I’d rather focus on the gospel because it’s what’s most important. But at the same time, that’s not to say that the moral issues and the choices affecting our country are not important at all.

Second place doesn’t mean they’re not important at all. It just means we’ve got to keep everything in the proper perspective. With that in mind, I’d like for us to look, hopefully not at my opinion, but what the Bible says about godly leaders and the choice that we have before us.

And don’t think I’m just talking about the presidency today. We’ve got other choices on the ballot. We’ve got other things coming up.

And folks, ultimately, no matter who wins and loses for all the races, from president on down to dog catcher, you don’t vote for that here, do you? Okay, people always say, wouldn’t vote for him for dog catcher. I’ve never voted for dog catcher in my life.

Anyway, but from president on down to dog catcher, regardless of who wins in November, God will still be on his throne, the gospel will still save souls, and things will ultimately turn out as God has said they will. But we still have a choice to make. And we as Christians want to make the best choice that we want to make.

It’d be very easy to, oh, that guy has the best commercial, I’ll vote for him. That guy has the right letter after his name, I’ll vote for him. It’s more important than any of those considerations that we consider, what does God say about our choice of leaders?

And really, surprisingly, compared to the great importance placed on it by a lot of ministries, the Bible doesn’t have a whole lot to say about choosing our leaders because we live in this idea of a Western liberal democracy that did not exist 2,000 years ago. And yet there are principles that God talks, even in the book of Psalms, about how men should want good kings and godly kings. And we can take from the Bible the ideals that, given this opportunity we have to choose, we should strive for.

Will we always have perfect choices on either side? No. But we can take biblical principles and we can apply them best we can and make the best choice that we can.

For ourselves, for our children, I told you, being a recovering political junkie, I kind of slacked off a little bit on politics, tried to pull myself away a little bit about the time we got married so that I didn’t drive my wife away. But around the time we started having children, I started getting pretty radical again because I started noticing things that were going to affect them. And so we owe it to ourselves.

We owe it to the country. We owe it to our children and grandchildren to make the best choices we can. And what has brought this on, briefly before we get to Romans 13, what’s brought this on this morning, churches across our country, I looked this morning at something like 1,500 churches across the country in all 50 states are participating in something they call Pulpit Freedom Sunday.

I heard about it on the radio here and thought it sounded like a good idea. They said, Pulpit Freedom Sunday because the church and the pastor should determine what is preached, what is said from the pulpit. And I thought, amen, I can get behind that.

And they said, we should talk about godly principles and how that affects legislation and policy. And I thought, I can get behind that too. And they said, and even endorsing candidates, and I thought, you’ve lost me there.

There’s a policy in place in our country, and it turns out the whole purpose behind Pulpit Freedom Sunday is to try to challenge this and force the IRS to do something about it. I don’t know that that’s the best approach to take in light of Romans 13, as we’re going to see. But I like the idea of proclaiming God’s truth.

Ultimately, we have the right to proclaim God’s truth, whatever it is. But even if we have the right, and I do believe the law is in error, constitutionally speaking, that we do have the right as a church to endorse somebody if we wanted to, but I think it would be probably the most foolish thing we could do. And so I won’t join with all of those today who are making endorsements.

Quite honestly, I’m not crazy about either of the two major party candidates. And from talking to most of you, I think a lot of you feel the same way. The president supports abortion and gay marriage, which are things that as a Bible-believing Christian I cannot get behind.

Governor Romney, on the other hand, has come out in support of something called the National Defense Authorization Act, which part of it, I’ve read, involves the right to detain on suspicion of terrorism American citizens and detain them indefinitely. And as a Christian looking at history, I think the idea of being able to arrest somebody arbitrarily because you think they might be up to something and throw them in jail indefinitely has never worked out well for the body of Christ. And so looking at both of these, it’s hard for me to get too excited about either one, but we do have a choice to make. And so it’s good for us to look and see what God says about good leaders.

And even if we did have a choice that everybody liked, It’s a bad idea for the church to yoke itself too much to one man. If Brother Darrell was running for president, you ready to throw your hat in the ring yet? If Brother Darrell was running for president, I have the utmost confidence that he could do a good job.

He’s a good man. We like him a lot. It would still be a bad idea for the church to say, we endorse Darrell Barker for president.

Because what happens, people tend to go off to office, and I’m not saying you would, but if Brother Darrell opened his mouth and said something foolish, or Brother Darrell did something that was morally questionable in office, then everybody says, oh, but the Christians supported him. supported that. I’ve seen it happen.

I’ve seen pastors back home that have tied themselves too much to political candidates, and when they mess up, people say, oh, well, that’s how the Christians really are. So we don’t want to endorse a candidate, but we do want to endorse God’s principles, which brings us to Romans chapter 13. In verse 1, he says, let every soul be subject unto the higher powers.

For there is no power but of God. The powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever receive to themselves damnation.

So far he’s really talking about our response to the government, our response to those in authority over us. And he has some strong words for us that we’ll talk about tonight. 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 the evil. It’s an interesting point. Rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil.

Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good, and thou shalt have the praise of the same. This is Paul writing to the church at Rome.

Paul who’d been in and out of prison since his conversion. Paul who had been oppressed, who’d been run out of town, who’d been on trial, all of these things throughout his entire life as a Christian and knew only too well how bad the idea of this oppressive government can be. He’s still writing to the Christians in Rome, the very epicenter of Roman power, where they could have been detained on suspicion of believing the wrong things and thrown in prison indefinitely and many times were.

Anything could have been done to them that the Roman government would have liked, and Paul still tells them not to resist Roman power but to be in submission to their authorities. Because he says the powers that be, he says the government, the rulers, are not a terror to good works. Not a terror to good works, but to evil.

So he tells them, do that which is good, and thou shalt have the praise of the same. It would be relatively easy for us to say something like that. If I were writing to you today to tell you, just do what’s right, and the government will, for the most part, leave you alone.

Just try to do what’s right, stay out of it. But no, we like to complain. We like to rail against our leaders.

And folks, I’m guilty of it too. And I’ve seen some of the emails that we all exchange. And folks, we’re all, you know, I believe in a little bit of healthy criticism when there are policies that need to be challenged, we have the right to do that.

In our system, we have the right to do that. I say I’ve seen some of the emails that we’ve exchanged. I can’t think of anybody in here that sent me an email like this, but I’ve seen emails like it where we get into name-calling and innuendo about those in authority over us.

And not just this president. We saw it with Bush. We saw it with Clinton.

Folks, when they’re wrong, they need to be challenged. But then there comes the point of personal attacks. And it’s easy for us to complain and gripe about those in authority over us.

It’s easy for us to hate those in authority over us. But here Paul, who had more to object to than we do, is writing to the church at Rome, who had more to object to than we do, and telling them, just keep doing the right thing. Keep respecting your authorities.

I can only imagine what he would have to say to us. I’m sorry, that’s really more for tonight. I’m getting ahead of myself.

Do that which is good, and thou shalt have the praise of the same. For he is the minister of God to thee for good. The ruler is the minister of God to us for good.

That’s God’s intent. That’s why God put them there. fear, honor to whom honor, and we’ll stop there.

Again, as I’ve mentioned already, a persecuted man, persecuted by the government, writing to another group of Christians, persecuted by the government, and telling them to respect the government, telling them that God has put this government in charge over them for their own good. Now, does that mean God put them there to persecute the church? I don’t think so.

Did God put them there to put pagan altars up? Did God put them there to oppress the people? I don’t believe so.

Paul explains here what the purpose of the government is for, what the rulers are supposed to be doing. Now, we know full well that rulers, that government leaders do not always live up to this standard, do they? Do they always live up to that standard?

No, they don’t. Folks, what I read in here, though, doesn’t just seem to apply to government rulers. He’s talking about all those in authority.

I in my home have authority over my children, And I’m supposed to revenge evil when it’s done. I’m supposed to keep them in line. I’m supposed to keep the peace.

I’m supposed to dispense justice. I’m supposed to do all these things and not be a terror to good works. As the Father, that’s my role and authority, to rule over them and to do it well.

And I can tell you, I don’t always live up to God’s perfect standard of how to do that. But you know what? When it comes to my shortfallings, it’s not up to my children to discipline me.

And by the way, when I say I fall short of that, I don’t mean I beat on them or anything. But when I mess up, when I’m not as just as I should be, it’s not my children’s position to discipline me. I’ll answer to God for how I’ve fallen short of the role He’s given me.

And in their day, God had set up the standard for what He put the government there for, what was God’s purpose for these rulers being there. And if they didn’t live up to it, folks, they were going to answer to God. And we have a little bit more of a say in things than they did because we can vote against them.

We have the right to petition. We have the right to speak out. We can do all these things.

but ultimately, no matter what penalty we can put on them, voting them out, impeaching them, maybe sometimes even criminal charges. The greatest court, the greatest justice that rulers will ever have to face when they don’t do the job that God placed them there for is that they will answer to God. And folks, if I were them, I’d be a lot more afraid of God than I would be of us.

Paul tells them to respect those in authority over them. He says, God has put them there for a reason. And if they don’t live up to that reason, God will take care of it.

but you keep doing what you’re supposed to do. It’s like when I talked about the series on the family, and I talked about the role that God has given the husband. And people tend to look at the Bible and say that God has given the.

. . It sounds like God gave the husband more rights, and it’s not fair.

Folks, on the contrary, I believe God gave the husband more responsibility. It’s not that the husband can do whatever he wants. The husband has got a massive job of loving the wife the way that Christ loved the church.

That’s a place where we are going to continuously fall short and have to answer for what we’ve done. But if you’ll remember, I told you the wives, the Bible says that the wives are supposed to submit to the husbands as well. And again, that doesn’t mean to be a doormat.

And I use my wife as an example because I think she’s a wonderful, godly, submissive woman, but you all know her. She’s no doormat. And if I’m wrong, she’s going to tell me about it.

She’ll graciously tell me, but she’s going to tell me. I figured I’d get an amen from one of the women there. But the question came up in the sermon on the role of the wives, well, what if my husband’s not a Christian?

What if my husband doesn’t love me the way Christ loved the church? And ladies, I would never tell you to stay there and be abused. I don’t believe God wants that either.

But what I’m telling you is if you can live in peace with that man, you continue doing what God has given you the job to do, and he’ll answer to God for what he has or hasn’t done. Folks, we have the same responsibility with our government. Are they going to be wrong?

You better believe it. We can elect good men and they’re still going to do wrong things. Folks, they’ll answer to God for it.

We still have the responsibility to do what we’re supposed to do. So what are the things that God has placed them there for? Because if we can look at the job description, we can look at individual men and women who are running and see do they fit with the job description.

Are they going to be people, have they been in the past, or will they be in the future, people who will, to the best of their ability, live up to what God’s put them there for? And I see about four things that we should look for from good rulers in this passage. The first is that good rulers protect the innocent.

Good rulers protect the innocent. It says in Romans 13, 3, 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 have the praise of the same. Now this, as a promise to the church at Rome, is not talking about good works in a spiritual sense. That if they’re serving God, they’re going to be all right with the Roman government, because we already knew and they already knew that was not going to be the case.

What he’s talking about here in doing good, doing well, is doing what we’re supposed to as subjects, as citizens under that jurisdiction. If they would behave as they were supposed to do, if any citizen will behave as it’s supposed to, as he or she is supposed to, the ideal is they would not have any trouble with their rulers. And I find that generally if I obey the speed limit, I pay my taxes and I don’t shoot people because they cut in front of me in line at the restaurant.

I don’t typically get into trouble with the government. How about you? If we step out of line, then the government comes and gets us because that’s their job.

But generally, if I do what I’m supposed to do, I don’t have any problem. That’s the ideal, that they would not be a terror to good works because they are there to keep the peace, to keep order, to protect the innocent. I’ve told some of you before, and I don’t like to talk a lot about my political beliefs, at least not from the pulpit, because like I said, I’d make half of you mad one week and half of you mad the other week.

But I’m a fairly libertarian person. That means I like my government so small you could drown it in a coffee mug. As little as possible, just leave me alone, let me raise my kids, do my job, and we’ll be fine.

Even at that, people mistake that for being an anarchist, that you want no government. Folks, as a Christian, I don’t believe that will work because I know that I believe in what the Bible calls the depravity of man. And I believe that we need somebody keeping us in line.

And God has instituted government for that purpose. Folks, if we didn’t have government of any sort, I’m not quite certain I believe that people’s consciences would rule them well enough that we could live in peace. Think about what happened in New Orleans after Katrina.

And suddenly legal authority had evaporated. It was gone. And people there didn’t obey their consciences because of what they’d been taught in the Catholic church or what they’d been taught at the Baptist church down the street or all the religious groups they had in New Orleans.

They didn’t behave themselves because it was the socially acceptable thing to do, folks. There was murder, there was looting, all these things going on, and I don’t believe that’s peculiar to New Orleans. I believe that left to ourselves, mankind is depraved, and left to ourselves will act on that depravity.

So there needs to be some force in place to protect the innocent. And again, I’m not talking about the morally innocent because none of us are morally innocent. But protecting those who have done no wrong according to the law.

I’m glad to be able to call the sheriff’s department if somebody breaks into my house. I’m glad they’re there. I’m glad we have the military protecting our borders when the politicians will let us so people don’t invade us.

I’m sorry. I told you I was going to try to keep my views out of it. I’ll do better.

But I’m glad there are legal authorities in place to keep the peace, to protect the innocent, because we know how awful people can be to each other. And so when we look for somebody to hold office, whatever office the case may be, we want to look for somebody who will protect the innocent. And I’m telling you, they’re not always there on either side.

And so when we see them, we need to support them. We need to vote for them. And folks, when they don’t, we need to pray for them.

Amen? But what I personally look for, you know, the Bible talks about so many things with what’s moral, with what’s right. It teaches about the sanctity of life, that we’re all created in God’s image, and that God ultimately is the one who decides when we live, when we die.

And folks, I think that’s a right worth protecting. I believe our government ought to protect the innocent when it comes to the most innocent and vulnerable among us. But folks, we can’t just say that’s the only life worth protecting.

The Bible also talks about oppressing the poor. And so many times we have politicians in both parties who like to give special privileges to different groups of people. And I’m not anti-business.

I’m pro-free market. That’s my view. And we see people from time to time that have given special tax incentives and things to multinational corporations, sending money to dictators overseas for whatever their agenda is, to get them to support it, to get them on board, and all the while taking that money from people over here, taking it from the poor who need it.

Ladies and gentlemen, whether we’re talking about abortion, whether we’re talking about economic matters, whether we’re talking about anything, we need to look for people who will protect the innocent, who will uphold the rule of law, because rulers are not to be a terror to good works but to the evil. Do that which is good, and thou shalt have the praise of the same. We should, given the choice, we should elect people who, if we will do what we’re supposed to do, will be looking out for us.

That’s their job. Second of all, good rulers impose justice. He’s the minister of God to thee for good.

But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid, for he beareth not the sword in vain, for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. It would be easy for us to say, well, as that article said that I read earlier, we’re citizens of a higher kingdom, so I can do what I want. Folks, I would love to trot that excuse out if I ever got pulled over.

I’ve never been pulled over for speeding, but I told you I got pulled over when we were moving here because they thought my trailer tags were improper, but I still had Oklahoma plates, so I didn’t have to have a tag. I would have loved to have told that sheriff’s deputy, sorry, Brother Mike, I would have loved to have told that sheriff’s deputy, I’m a citizen of the higher kingdom, you can’t do anything to me. That would not have worked out well for me.

See, as far as he knew, I was in the wrong. I’m driving in Arkansas without a tag on my trailer. he had every right to pull me over because it looked like I was in violation of the law.

It says, he’s the minister of God to thee for good, but if thou do that which is evil, be afraid, for he beareth not the sword in vain. It talks about the sword of justice, that when we do wrong, we should expect to be punished. For he beareth not the sword in vain, for he is the minister of God, a revenger, to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil.

Folks, the people we want in office are going to be the people who will promote justice. And I’m not just talking about justice for those other people when they do wrong. Yes, we want somebody who’s not going to just let the murderers and the robbers and all those people go free.

We want somebody who’s going to impose justice when the law is broken, it’s broken, and the penalty needs to be paid. Folks, for that to hold up at all, we’ve also got to be willing to recognize that we’re under that justice as well. And we don’t want people who are going to do special favors for us or anybody else.

Folks, if I’m wrong, especially as a believer, I ought to be open to correction. And the Bible talks here about the ruler bearing the sword against those who do evil. And I don’t believe God’s saying here that he’s given the rulers the job of going lopping off heads just because somebody ran a red light, although that would certainly cut down on it.

That was a joke. That would certainly cut down on it. But I believe he’s talking about the sword, sometimes in a literal sense, sometimes maybe in a metaphorical sense, that there’s that force there, that power to impose justice on us.

Folks, we ought to look for rulers who are going to promote justice, that when wrong is done, it will be set to right the best of their ability. Now, there are some wrongs that will not be righted until the king returns. But as best they can, we should look for people who are just. We should look at their record.

Do they have a record of playing favorites? And sometimes the laws apply to some people and not to others. Maybe political friends, they get by with things.

Maybe people who believe they themselves are above the law. Or are they people who love and promote justice? That when wrong is done, it should be set to right the best we can.

Third of all, good rulers can be followed in clear conscience. He tells them in verse 5, Wherefore you must needs be subject not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake. Not only for wrath, but for conscience sake.

He tells them to be subject, in other words, to obey, to fall in line, do what they’re supposed to do. not just for wrath’s sake, not just because you’re going to be punished if you don’t, but for conscience’s sake. Because we as Christians, we know what’s right and we know what’s wrong.

And we hear that voice inside us. And I used to think it was wrong to talk about our conscience because I said, well, that’s the Holy Spirit talking to us. But folks, the Bible talks about the conscience.

And I believe the Holy Spirit speaks to our conscience. And we know the difference between right and wrong. And we know that when we do wrong, when we do wrong, we’re not right with God.

And we, as the rulers have been placed there by God, as much as we can follow the law of the land and still obey God, we ought to do so not just because we’re going to get punished if we don’t, but because it’s the right thing to do. Right now, we’re at a point where Benjamin, my son, will avoid doing certain things he knows he’s not supposed to do because he doesn’t want to get a spanking. Or he doesn’t want to get time out.

We don’t do time out a lot. We don’t spank a lot either, just when it’s necessary. But he doesn’t want the consequence, whatever it’s going to be.

You know, you hit the dog with that toy, we’ll take that toy away. You hit mama, you’re going to get a spanking, those kinds of things. And so he’ll avoid those behaviors for wrath’s sake.

But what I hope is that eventually as he grows and matures, my son will get to the point where he will obey for conscience’s sake because he knows what’s right and does it simply because it’s right. What Paul is cautioning the church about and cautioning us about is avoiding this childlike, this juvenile, this immature view of right and wrong