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From my earliest days of knowing Jesus Christ through the new birth, I remember being taught that Christians should, quote, “obey the law of the land.” Romans 13:1 was used to support this teaching. It states,
“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.”
The reasoning ran like this: Since God allowed the current civil government to exist, we, as Christians, should submit to it. Later I would learn that there’s just enough truth in that idea to be dangerous!!
Don’t misunderstand me: God did create civil government, as we just read about in Romans 13. He did it to control the “sin-root” in man so that one man could not take away another man’s rights of “life, liberty, or property”. And all citizens, including Christians, are to obey law that is designed to protect those rights. That part of the teaching was right. But the implication that all laws do protect God-given rights was the part that was bad wrong! Wicked government servants, like Pharaoh or Nebuchadnezzar, can make bad laws. In that case Christians are not obligated to obey those laws! If we submit to bad law, all liberty will quickly be destroyed! Continue reading



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