Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Our epistle reading is the second half of Romans chapter 13. Although our reading begins with verse 8, I’d like to also speak about what comes before it. The context for our reading is important. Chapter 13 starts out this way: “Everyone must submit to the governing authorities. For no authority exists except by God, and the authorities that do exist have been established by God. Therefore the one who rebels against the authority is opposing God’s institution, and those who oppose will bring judgment on themselves.” During quiet and peaceable times, this passage is rather vanilla. It’s included in our Catechism’s table of duties for what is required of us towards our rulers. It’s an application of the fourth commandment to honor our father and mother and other authorities. Normally, these are not difficult doctrines. However, never during my lifetime has there been talk like there has been lately. Before this year I had never heard anyone talk seriously about civil war being possible. This year I’ve heard people seriously discuss this on various forums. Now, to be clear, I do not think that this will actually happen. But I think it is telling that such talk is not immediately dismissed by absolutely everyone as being crack-headed. Even though it is still a very remote possibility, the reason why the idea has been entertained by people is that we are only becoming more and more divided. The legitimacy of our rulers is called into question by various groups. The legitimacy of the latest supreme court justice has been questioned. The legitimacy of the president elect has been questioned. Both of these examples have been from opposing sides. Some democrats have questioned one. Some republicans have questioned the other. Questions of legitimacy are, indeed, one of the ways that civil wars can start, even though I think our country is not in great danger of that right now. Regardless, it might be high time for us to blow the dust off Romans 13 and learn from it how we should think about government and our relationship to it. So, as we’ve already noted, Paul says that everyone must submit to the governing authorities, because no authority exists except by God, and the authorities that exist have been established by God. In a way, what Paul says is remarkable for what he doesn’t say almost more than what he does say. For example, he doesn’t say that we should only submit to those governing authorities who are good. He also doesn’t say that we should only submit to those governing authorities who are godly. Perhaps most surprising of all is that he doesn’t say we should only submit to those governing authorities who are legitimate and who came into power in the correct, orderly way. He simply says, “Submit to the governing authorities, for those who govern do so by God’s institution.” Normally an argument from silence is not very powerful, but here I think it is significant. The Roman emperors during Paul’s lifetime were not good or godly or what we would think of as legitimate. Several of them are famous for debauchery and perversion. They all thought that they were divine and were deserving of people’s worship. At least a couple of them came to power by murdering their predecessor. Several Christians had already been put to death by governing authorities by the time Paul wrote this letter. Eventually Paul himself would be executed by the government too. So Paul couldn’t have had a Pollyannaish view of the governing authorities, where he naively said that we should submit to them because he was unaware of the political intrigue that could be involved. No, with eyes wide open he says we should submit to the governing authorities. Now understand that what Paul says is dissatisfactory to everyone with the possible exception of Christians. You are never going to find a civics textbook or a political science book that says what Paul says. Paul, at the same time, is demanding too much, and has his s