The prophetic witness of Christians in the face of the State is muted, I think, by a serious misreading of Romans 13. Particularly 13.1: "Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For
there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are
established by God". I want to explore what it means to read Romans 13 in light of the rest of Scripture, in order to help us understand that we don't necessarily have to accept every line that proceeds out of a particular politician's mouth or every policy proposed by any certain politically reigning group.
A caveat lector is probably in order here, though: What you're about to read is the way I read Romans 13, which is informed by the way folks like Bonhoeffer and Barth read Romans 13 and resisted the Nazi German agenda. It's the foundation of why I resist Donald Trump (and, before him, Obama and lots of other American politicians). To let the cat out of the bag early: I resist them because I follow Jesus.
The problem, I think, centers around the way Christians hear what Paul, and later Peter in 1 Peter 2, have to say. Things like: "Submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every human institution, whether to a king as the one in authority, or to governors as sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and the praise of those who do right". As I've told my students over the years: Reading texts like that in the context of the Roman Empire, changes the radical nature of what they're actually calling Christians to do.
When you deliberately engage those calls for subjection within the context of the Romans Empire and within the narrative of Peter and Paul's apostolic mission and ministry and preaching, something quite radical occurs: Romans 13 (and 1 Peter 2) find their balance in Revelation 13 and Psalm 2 -- giving us a glimpse of a uniquely Christian resistance toward the powers-that-be. Submission to the rule of law including respecting those in authority when and only when that didn't counter their allegiance to Jesus as Lord. You honor those in authority, but also confront them when necessary, and then accept the consequences of that confrontation as a part of our protest.
Jesus, Peter and Paul were all arrested, beaten, and imprisoned for their missional activities, and Paul wrote at least four of his Epistles from prison. Yet Paul still viewed all categories of rulers and authorities governing the world as part of the originally good creation, made by Christ:
Paul and Peter (this is what Barth and Bonhoeffer understood so uniquely in the face of Nazi oppression) are calling for Christians to be in a kind of subjection to whatever government or political party is in power in these times towards the end of history -- whether that be a democracy, a caliphate, a fascist dictatorship, a monarchy or maybe even a mafia or gang network that rules a failed state. They recommended that kind of subjection for a community that would continue in the midst of so much hostile terrain, so that the fragile faith community would survive, even when everything else was crumbling around them. And they would do it by continuing to bear witness to Jesus: "If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all people" (Romans 12.18).
The witness of Romans 13, when heard with all the rest of the voices of the Old and New Testaments, is advice given to prisoners living out their prison sentence: Keep going until you reach the End.
But here's the part that the modern American Religious and Secular Right never get: None of that is a call to endorsement of the State as God's agent. There is no cozy alliance between God and the powers-that-be. They're in as much open rebellion to God as the rest of God's enemies -- as we are.
Jesus, Peter and Paul called for allegiance to God as the highest calling for Christians who are entangled in political environments: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself" (Luke 10.27).
What that means, of course, is that Christians cannot and will not obey unjust laws. And won't remain silent in the face of that injustice. It just means that what they say and do is said and done as Jesus says and does it in the gospels. "For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps" (1 Peter 2.21). Jesus resisted authorities when he healed on the Sabbath, cleansed the Temple and strongly critiqued religious leaders. Peter and Paul went right on preaching when told not to, and willingly suffered the consequences. The first Christians refused military service and worship of Caesar as Lord and suffered torture, imprisonment and execution. That's the radical nature of "in his steps". Paul appears to have often considered governing authorities his enemies, writing strong words regarding enemy love right before Romans 13: "Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse" and end with "do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good" (Romans 12.14, 21). When you allow those to sink in, there's a really different feel to Romans 12 than lots of American Christians think Romans 12 says.
Jesus models a quiet authority and confidence before the Roman governor of Judea Pontius Pilate, after he informed him he had authority to release him or crucify him with: "You would have no authority over me, unless it had been given you from above" (John 19.11) -- ultimately from himself! This is why "power is given to the dragon" in Revelation so often. He doesn't have it from himself, and certainly only has the power he thinks he has because of Jesus' own patience with a rebellious creature.
The earliest Christians saw Jesus' submission of his authority to the powers-that-be as the greatest power to transform the world: Self-giving love. That love is greater than any power that would-be-powers think they have. That love is the transforming death-blow to their power and is the criterion by which their power will ultimately be judged and submit to Jesus (1 Corinthians 15.24-27).
Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2 must be read in the light of Psalm 2, which begins by asking a question that Christians in America and in many other nations should be asking: "Why are the nations in an uproar and the peoples imaging a vain thing?" Which finds its mirror in the modern equivalent: "Why do we get so caught up in endorsing this or that political candidate and mirroring the hate-filled speech that spews out of the mouth of this particular dragon?"
My sense is that Christians have lost an understanding of the powers-that-be that pervades the New Testament because we've so spiritualized the text. It can only be talking about the salvation of souls, not the transformation of a rebellious world into a submissive one. This is a perspective that the psalmist is quite clear about: "The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his anointed" (Psalm 2.2). Jesus experienced hostility from rulers and authorities, and prophesied his followers would experience the same (Mark 13.9; Luke 12.11) -- which they did (Acts 4.5). Being a martyr literally meant that you would keep talking about Jesus' authority over the whole earth as the One crucified and risen until they finally kill us. It's why the Greek word for "witness" (μάρτυς/martus) is literally our word "martyr".
Christians submit to the powers-that-be not because they're good or because we're perfecting them in our submission. We submit because Jesus is Lord. Our citizenship is in the Kingdom of God. We are "aliens and foreigners". In that identity comes the power of the crucified and risen one to transform the world in love:
That's why the psalmist is quick to warn:
A caveat lector is probably in order here, though: What you're about to read is the way I read Romans 13, which is informed by the way folks like Bonhoeffer and Barth read Romans 13 and resisted the Nazi German agenda. It's the foundation of why I resist Donald Trump (and, before him, Obama and lots of other American politicians). To let the cat out of the bag early: I resist them because I follow Jesus.
The problem, I think, centers around the way Christians hear what Paul, and later Peter in 1 Peter 2, have to say. Things like: "Submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every human institution, whether to a king as the one in authority, or to governors as sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and the praise of those who do right". As I've told my students over the years: Reading texts like that in the context of the Roman Empire, changes the radical nature of what they're actually calling Christians to do.
When you deliberately engage those calls for subjection within the context of the Romans Empire and within the narrative of Peter and Paul's apostolic mission and ministry and preaching, something quite radical occurs: Romans 13 (and 1 Peter 2) find their balance in Revelation 13 and Psalm 2 -- giving us a glimpse of a uniquely Christian resistance toward the powers-that-be. Submission to the rule of law including respecting those in authority when and only when that didn't counter their allegiance to Jesus as Lord. You honor those in authority, but also confront them when necessary, and then accept the consequences of that confrontation as a part of our protest.
Jesus, Peter and Paul were all arrested, beaten, and imprisoned for their missional activities, and Paul wrote at least four of his Epistles from prison. Yet Paul still viewed all categories of rulers and authorities governing the world as part of the originally good creation, made by Christ:
For by him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities -- all things have been created through him and for him” (Colossians 1.16).These non-human powers are therefore as fallen and rebellious as we are. I mean, just think of the beast of Revelation 13. They're operating until the End, when everything will be brought back into submission to Jesus as Lord: "At the name of Jesus every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father" (Philippians 2.10).
Paul and Peter (this is what Barth and Bonhoeffer understood so uniquely in the face of Nazi oppression) are calling for Christians to be in a kind of subjection to whatever government or political party is in power in these times towards the end of history -- whether that be a democracy, a caliphate, a fascist dictatorship, a monarchy or maybe even a mafia or gang network that rules a failed state. They recommended that kind of subjection for a community that would continue in the midst of so much hostile terrain, so that the fragile faith community would survive, even when everything else was crumbling around them. And they would do it by continuing to bear witness to Jesus: "If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all people" (Romans 12.18).
The witness of Romans 13, when heard with all the rest of the voices of the Old and New Testaments, is advice given to prisoners living out their prison sentence: Keep going until you reach the End.
But here's the part that the modern American Religious and Secular Right never get: None of that is a call to endorsement of the State as God's agent. There is no cozy alliance between God and the powers-that-be. They're in as much open rebellion to God as the rest of God's enemies -- as we are.
Jesus, Peter and Paul called for allegiance to God as the highest calling for Christians who are entangled in political environments: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself" (Luke 10.27).
What that means, of course, is that Christians cannot and will not obey unjust laws. And won't remain silent in the face of that injustice. It just means that what they say and do is said and done as Jesus says and does it in the gospels. "For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps" (1 Peter 2.21). Jesus resisted authorities when he healed on the Sabbath, cleansed the Temple and strongly critiqued religious leaders. Peter and Paul went right on preaching when told not to, and willingly suffered the consequences. The first Christians refused military service and worship of Caesar as Lord and suffered torture, imprisonment and execution. That's the radical nature of "in his steps". Paul appears to have often considered governing authorities his enemies, writing strong words regarding enemy love right before Romans 13: "Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse" and end with "do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good" (Romans 12.14, 21). When you allow those to sink in, there's a really different feel to Romans 12 than lots of American Christians think Romans 12 says.
Jesus models a quiet authority and confidence before the Roman governor of Judea Pontius Pilate, after he informed him he had authority to release him or crucify him with: "You would have no authority over me, unless it had been given you from above" (John 19.11) -- ultimately from himself! This is why "power is given to the dragon" in Revelation so often. He doesn't have it from himself, and certainly only has the power he thinks he has because of Jesus' own patience with a rebellious creature.
The earliest Christians saw Jesus' submission of his authority to the powers-that-be as the greatest power to transform the world: Self-giving love. That love is greater than any power that would-be-powers think they have. That love is the transforming death-blow to their power and is the criterion by which their power will ultimately be judged and submit to Jesus (1 Corinthians 15.24-27).
Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2 must be read in the light of Psalm 2, which begins by asking a question that Christians in America and in many other nations should be asking: "Why are the nations in an uproar and the peoples imaging a vain thing?" Which finds its mirror in the modern equivalent: "Why do we get so caught up in endorsing this or that political candidate and mirroring the hate-filled speech that spews out of the mouth of this particular dragon?"
My sense is that Christians have lost an understanding of the powers-that-be that pervades the New Testament because we've so spiritualized the text. It can only be talking about the salvation of souls, not the transformation of a rebellious world into a submissive one. This is a perspective that the psalmist is quite clear about: "The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his anointed" (Psalm 2.2). Jesus experienced hostility from rulers and authorities, and prophesied his followers would experience the same (Mark 13.9; Luke 12.11) -- which they did (Acts 4.5). Being a martyr literally meant that you would keep talking about Jesus' authority over the whole earth as the One crucified and risen until they finally kill us. It's why the Greek word for "witness" (μάρτυς/martus) is literally our word "martyr".
Christians submit to the powers-that-be not because they're good or because we're perfecting them in our submission. We submit because Jesus is Lord. Our citizenship is in the Kingdom of God. We are "aliens and foreigners". In that identity comes the power of the crucified and risen one to transform the world in love:
Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation (1 Peter 2.11-12).Christian submission to rulers and authorities must be done from a perspective of open-eyed realism about both the rebellious, hostile orientation of the powers against the reign of God and Jesus' greater sovereignty and victory.
He who sits in the heavens laughs, the Lord scoffs at them. Then he will speak to them in his anger and terrify them in his fury, saying, 'But as for me, I have installed my King upon Zion, my holy mountain' (Psalm 2.4-6).Jesus is that King, the Son of the Father, and he has made it so that we are sons and daughters of the inheritance of the Kingdom, but in the submission to the love made known in Jesus Christ, not in the idolatrous submission to any other would-be claimant to that authority.
I will surely tell of the decree of the Lord: He said to me, 'You are my Son, today I have begotten you'. Ask of me, and I will surely give the nations as your inheritance, and the very ends of the earth as your possession (Psalm 2.4-8).What American Christians seem to forget is that Jesus is installed as King on the cross, and in his submission to the powers-that-be God humbled every other worldly power that is in rebellion to God's Rule. God "disarmed the rulers and authorities, he made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through him [Jesus]" (Colossians 2.15).
That's why the psalmist is quick to warn:
You shall break them with a rod of iron, you shall shatter them like earthenware.Psalm 2, I think, is much more hopeful about a Christian politic of resistance than the triumphalist interpretations of Romans 13. Jesus' submission to the Father means that every other rebellious power will ultimately be brought into submission to the Father because of Jesus. Jesus Christ is King, and every other would-be claimant to power and authority derives their claim to that power and authority only because God is patient to find redemption for all of creation -- a whole creation that now yearns for that very redemption -- through our patient submission to Jesus as children of the Father (Romans 8.18-39).