Romans 13:1 - Governing authorities

This chapter is considered by some to be quite difficult to interpret, even to be problematic. Indeed there are some who argue that verses 1-7 were not part of the original letter. Why is there this controversy? It is because it is to do with the relationship between Christians and the state. Those who say v1-7 were not part of the original letter base this on the fact that Jesus is not mentioned and see it as appeasing the Roman state. However, such views do not have much foundation. First, the teaching here is consistent with the rest of the Bible. For instance, 1 Peter expresses similar sentiments to those found here. Secondly we must not read this in isolation. There are some who say it has caused too much trouble, providing legitimacy to tyrannical regimes. We need to look at the whole. If we consider all that Paul did as recorded in Acts we see that he certainly did not adopt a supine approach to authority. We need to take the teaching here as foundational to our understanding, but bearing in mind all that we find elsewhere in Scripture. We should look in particular at the life of Jesus. He too taught a respect for authority, and did not seek to lead a rebellion.

In Paul’s time Rome was the all powerful authority, and the Jewish religion had some legal protections. If Christianity was viewed as a branch of Judaism by the state it shared in these protections, if it was not then it was subject to persecution.

The starting point is that governments were implemented by God, and they are there to maintain order, justice and to help the weak. Now we all know that no government does this perfectly, and there are many times when governments are utterly corrupt or tyrannical. What are we to do in such situations? Well we do well to learn from the book of Daniel. Babylon was about as ungodly a government as one could imagine. Indeed Babylon was used as code for Rome, and is used in Revelation as representative of all that is evil. If we look at how Daniel and his friends reacted we see that they showed respect for the government, Nebuchadnezzar in particular, throughout. Yet at the same time they did not compromise their faith. This also brought them into confrontation with the government, and in the midst of this they experienced God’s miraculous intervention. If we make rebelliousness the starting point we may very well feel self-righteous and justified in our actions, but what we will be doing is living out of our flesh, and that we will very soon result in rebelling against God, as chapter 8 of Romans warns. Instead we must love God above all, have an attitude of respect towards authority and let the Spirit lead us. Then there will indeed be confrontations, but these will be of God’s choosing and we are far more likely to living by the Spirit than by the flesh.