[Gary Petty] Nero was one of the most despotic rulers of all history – the ancient Roman emperor. His cruelty, his absolute immorality in the way he treated people, his sexual perversions, his insanity are all well documented. He was the emperor of the Roman Empire around 57 AD when the apostle Paul wrote something in Romans 13.

Romans, chapter 13 – it presents us with what seems like a very difficult problem as Christians. It actually can be a very difficult problem, but it’s actually a much bigger issue. If we just read this and take it as it says without understanding the bigger issue, we can come to a wrong conclusion. But notice what he says in verse 1 of Romans 13:

Romans 13:1 – Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority, except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God. Therefore, whoever resists the authority resists the ordinance of God, and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same. For he is God’s minister to you for good. But, if you do evil, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain, for he is God’s minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil. Therefore, you must be subject, not only because of wrath, but for conscience sake. For because of this, you also pay taxes, for they are God’s ministers attending continually to this very thing. Render, therefore, to all their due – taxes to whom taxes are due, customs to whom customs are due, fear to whom fear, and honor to whom honor.

Now, understand what Paul’s telling the church – that this despotic, evil ruler is to be given the honor due to him, even to the point of paying taxes. And these very taxes were being used to finance persecution of the church. You think, “Well, Paul must have lost his mind – saying that they’re the ministers of God?” I mean, would you believe it, if I get up here and say, “Look, the President of the United States and our Congress are the ministers of God?” or, if Vladimir Putin – the head of Russia – is the minister of God?  You’d say, “Well, that’s horrible! Who would ever think of that?” Believe me, none of these rulers are any worse than Nero was. So what does Paul mean by this?

Today we’re going to look at one of the most controversial subjects in the Bible, but we have to understand it in context – of the greater context of what is being taught. That’s why this ties into what I talked about last week.

Last week I went through and showed the authority of God. We don’t like the word authority. In fact, what I’m going to go through today is, how authority is applied when it is delegated to human beings. Boy, it’s tough. This is one of the most difficult and one of the most controversial teachings in the Bible. We don’t talk about this much. I don’t give sermons on this too much, because I know, afterwards, I will spend the next two weeks listening to people argue, in my congregations, about what I said. “That’s not what the Bible really means. It can’t mean that.” But what does it mean? Obviously, Nero wasn’t God’s servant. He wasn’t a minister of God. What does this mean? What is Paul teaching?
Well, last week we talked about God’s authority. And we have to understand rights and responsibilities. We talked about the rights that God gives to us. We talked about how the US Constitution says that we have unalienable rights given to us by our Creator – life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. And that very phrase is so ambiguous. What does it really mean? If my pursuit of happiness is your car, why can’t I take it? If my pursuit of happiness is same sex marriage, why can’t I have it? See, this is the argument going on today. Much of the argument going on inside the United States today is the right to pursue happiness, because God gave that right – life and liberty. We have the liberty to do whatever we want. Of course, we have a government that has thousands and thousands…I mean, when you take county laws, and city laws, and federal laws, and state laws, we live under a crushing burden of laws. But what is liberty really? We can’t look to the US Constitution for a definition of this. We have to look at the scripture.

So we go and look at what God says. He gives us rights, but all rights come from God, and God can take every one of those rights back, because He has the authority to do so. And what I showed last week is that authority is based on His ownership. He owns the universe. He gives us the right to choose. He gave us a remarkable right. In Genesis, He said, “Don’t eat of this tree.” Now, when He gives us the right to choose, He always tells us what to do, by the way. “Don’t do this. If you do, something really bad is going to happen. So don’t do it. But you get to choose.” He gave them the right to choose. They chose wrongly and we’ve been suffering from that ever since. We’ve been living in a nightmare of living in humanity separated from God. You turned back to God. And when you did, you acknowledged His ownership of you. That’s what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 6.

So we spent much of the time last week talking about the pursuit of God’s will. If He owns us, then we are to pursue His will – His desires, what He wants. 1 Corinthians 6:19 says:

1 Corinthians 6:19 – Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.

We will never truly have the relationship with God that we want until we acknowledge that we are owned by Him and He has all rights. He has every right over every aspect of my life and your life.

And I said there were two things that are absolutely necessary for us to accept that and live with that and respond to that. We have to trust God and we have to believe in His love. We have to accept His love and we have to love Him. We have to trust God and we have to love Him. If you don’t trust God, eventually you will grab ownership of your life and you won’t let go. If you don’t believe in His law, then you don’t love Him. Eventually, you will go against what He wants because you just won’t love Him. You won’t believe in His love and you won’t love Him.

So, really, it just comes down to, our obedience must be motivated by trust – faith – and it must be motivated by a relationship of love. And in that trust and that love, we accept that He owns us. It is ownership. It is absolute authority. He has the right to take away our rights. He has the right to give us rights. And they’re His.

Now, if I trust in His righteousness, and I trust in His love, I do know that whatever He is going to do is going to work out in the end, because He says it will. But there are times when it feels like it’s not working out. But, if we have trust, and we have that love, and we say, “Okay, I believe that You are going to work this out for what’s best for me. You own me. You care for me. And I will trust You.” And then we accept His authority.

Now, let’s look at this principle of authority that Paul’s talking about, though, in Romans 13. Romans 13 was used in the Middle Ages – they call it the Ages of the Kings – because kings in Europe used this scripture to claim that they had total ownership over their subjects – that this scripture said that they owned their subjects and their subjects owed them total and complete obedience, no matter what. And so, if they told them to disobey the law, people had to disobey the law. The king’s authority – the king’s law – came from him. They could even argue that you didn’t have to keep the scripture. And there were kings in Europe that told people to do things against the scriptures. Their argument was, “We have the authority to do that, because Paul gives us that authority in Romans 13.”

Let’s look at what he says now. Let’s go back to Romans 13.

Romans 13:1 – Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God. The point he’s making here is, that God delegates authority. God has delegated authority to civil governments. That goes clear back to Genesis. After the flood, God said, “You have the right to take human life, if they murder.” He gave the right to human government to take the life of somebody who had committed murder. That’s pretty enormous authority. He said, “I delegate this authority.” Now, it’s not God’s fault that human beings – ever since we left Eden – have absolutely abused our authority. But the thing is, He said, “You have this authority. If you’re not going to follow Me, I will give you the authority to, at least, govern yourselves.” Now, he didn’t say that he approved of Nero. Nero’s not even mentioned here. He didn’t say that he approved of the Roman government. He didn’t say it was a good thing. He just said, “We have to recognize that He has given human beings the right to have civil governments and that it is a responsibility of Christians to live under those civil governments.”

Remember Nebuchadnezzar, the ancient Babylonian king? That man wasn’t a man of God. That man was a despotic ruler – an evil man, in many ways. He had a dream. And he didn’t know the meaning of the dream. Let’s go to Daniel 4, verse 17. Of course, there are numerous places in Daniel that have to do with the dreams that Nebuchadnezzar had. God is giving him these dreams and, then, using Daniel to explain the dreams. Daniel, chapter 4, and verse 17…he’s explained to him the dream, and he said, “By the way, Nebuchadnezzar, because you are not obeying God, God is going to make you like an animal to teach you that your authority really comes from Him – that you only have the right to rule because God gave you the right. Now, you’ve abused that right – you’ve misused that right. You’ve been a despotic, cruel ruler, but it’s only because God gave you the leeway to do that. God could take it back at any time.” And it says, in verse 17:

Daniel 4:17 - This decision is by the decree of the watchers – so this is the decision – and the sentence by the word of the holy ones, in order that the living may know – he says, “You have a dream and here’s what God’s going to do, so that the living may know – that the Most High rules in the kingdom of men, gives it to whomever He will, and sets over it the lowest of men. Do you know what happened after this? Nebuchadnezzar became an animal for seven years. He lived out in a field. He had no mind. He ate grass. His fingernails grew. He became covered with hair. People saw the greatest man on the face of the earth…and they could see him out in this field, like some kind of wild beast. Why did God do that? To tell Nebuchadnezzar, “I just want you to remember, any authority you have is simply because I let you have it for a little bit.”

What’s interesting is, when you look through the story of Nebuchadnezzar, you will see over and over again where God’s people had to live under the authority of Nebuchadnezzar – Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego. And when you read their stories, you see men who were actually very good citizens, and yet, time after time after time, had to stand up to the authority and say, “That is against God. I cannot do that.” Now this is very important. Remember, we talked about God’s ownership. We talked about people have authority, because all authority, eventually, belongs to God. Guess what Christ does when He comes back. The first thing He does is, He takes all authority. Satan rules on this earth right now. We know that. Does Satan rule on this earth because he’s more powerful than God? Is Satan the God of this world because he’s more powerful than God? Satan is on this earth because God has given him a little time. That’s why he’s on this earth – because God has given him a little time. And God, someday, takes his authority away, and says, “You cannot have it anymore.” Human beings are given – each generation – a little time. Now, that doesn’t mean, by the way, that God sets up every ruler in every place – you know, in every little tribe. What it means is, God allows this authority to happen. And He does, occasionally, set up people so that His plan takes place.

So when Paul talks about – chapter 13 of Romans – when he says, “Look, all authority comes from God,” he isn’t saying that Nero is a personal representative of God. What he’s saying is, he’s only allowed to be there because God allows human authority. And so he tells Christians, “As long as you are under that authority, you are to try to submit to it, even to the point,” he says, “Pay your taxes.” Now, there’s always, in the church, on a regular basis, there are people that say, “Surely, God doesn’t expect us to pay our taxes.” The apostle Paul told them to do so in a very, very evil government, because they had the authority to run that government. It didn’t matter if it was evil. But remember, that doesn’t mean that we are to participate in the evil. That’s the point.

This is the point where we come to: the government tells me to pay my taxes, so I do. If the government tells me to give up this Book, I will not. Okay? Why? Because the one is submitting to the authority that God gave them to do. Do they have the authority to take this Book? No, they do not, because God owns this. This all has to do with God’s ownership. The government does not own us.

Now we have a responsibility before God to be good citizens, even in an evil government. That’s what he told those people. That’s what Daniel, and Shadrach, and Meshach, and Abednego had to exemplify while being citizens of the Babylonian government. They were good citizens, except when they were told to do something against God’s ownership. Someday, you will be asked – as all Christians are – to do something against God’s ownership, and you will have to decide who owns you. Who owns you? The government doesn’t own you. But that doesn’t mean we can be anarchists. It doesn’t mean we can rebel.

Look at Acts, chapter 5. Here we have the example of the earliest church. The apostles were actually being, in this case, abused by the civil, religious government of the Jews – eventually the Romans. Here it says:

Acts 5:27 – And when they had brought them, they set them before the high council. And the high priest asked them – so this is in verse 27. The apostles are brought before the Sanhedrin, which is both the political and religious ruling body of Judea, at the time. …saying, “Did we not strictly command you not to teach in this name? They had been commanded not to teach in the name of Jesus. Now, if you look through the book of Acts, you will see that they were honest people. They obeyed the laws. You will never see any Christian – any prominent Christian – arrested because they were simply breaking the laws of the land, except when the laws of the land told them to do something that was against the ownership of God. “Did we not tell you not to teach in the name of Jesus Christ? And look, you have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this Man’s blood on us.” But Peter and the other apostles answered and said, “We ought to obey God rather than men.”

We must obey God rather than men. Does that mean that they, then, decided that anarchy, or rebelling against the government, was proper? If you go through the entire New Testament, you will find people arrested, beaten, stoned, killed, scattered, and you will not find one case, in the New Testament, where the Christians violently fought against either the Jewish government or the Roman government. It’s not there. In many ways, they were model citizens. But it always came down to, “Who owns you? Who owns you?”

Acts 22 is very interesting in this, because the apostle Paul here – Acts 22 – he had to deal with a number of these situations. In verse 30:

Acts 22:30 – The next day, because he wanted to know for certain why he was accused by the Jews – and this is where Paul had been brought before a Roman official – he released him from his bonds, and commanded the chief priests and all their council to appear, and brought Paul down and set him before them.

Acts 23:1 – Then Paul, looking earnestly at the council, said, “Men and brethren, I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day.” And the high priest Ananias commanded those who stood by him to strike him on the mouth. Then Paul said to him, “God will strike you, you whitewashed wall! For you sit to judge me according to the law, and do you command me to be struck contrary to the law?” And those who stood by said, “Do you revile God's high priest?” Then Paul said, “I did not know, brethren, that he was the high priest; for it is written, ‘You shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people.’” I mean, Paul was being slapped! And Paul just puts down the man that slapped him. And the people said, “Wait a minute. He’s the high priest.” And Paul said, “Okay, the law says I can’t do that. The law says I cannot do that.” The law he was talking about was the law of God. “Okay, I’ll take this man’s slap because he’s the high priest.” He went on to defend himself, by the way. He didn’t say, “Okay, I’ll give up preaching in the name of Jesus Christ.” He didn’t do that. But he recognized that that man was only in office because God allowed him to be there. Difficult problem, isn’t it?

You and I are to submit to the civil government, unless they tell us to not submit to God. To tell you the truth, I’ve thought about this. The way the world is going, and the way they’re retroactively dealing with things, five years from now, just because of things that we have written – that are on the Internet – or presented on Beyond Today programs, or sermons that have been given that are out on the Internet, there’s a good chance I’ll be in jail. That’s a reality. I don’t like that. But, there are times when you have to obey God rather than men. But that doesn’t mean we can be anarchists. It doesn’t mean that we can just actively fight the government. Very difficult, but it’s based on the idea that we understand what Paul says there in Romans 13 – God has all authority. He’s delegated some authority to human governments. We live under the abuse of those human governments. But who is our allegiance to? God. If it’s to God, then we respond to those human governments as good citizens. Not easy, is it?

When we get into the subject that we’re talking about today, the reason why this is so hard for us to do is, because it takes incredible character and trust in God to do it! It takes incredible character and trust in God to do it.

Now, does that mean we can’t criticize the government? Paul criticized the government – where it was against God. That’s why it’s very important for us not to become politically minded, because we are supposed to be able to criticize the government when it’s against God, not by which political party they belong to – because our allegiance is to God first, but we are good citizens.

Okay, let’s break this down a little more. Okay? Let’s talk about something else – you kids, your parental authority over you. Do they have authority over you? Colossians 3:20:

Colossians 3:20 – Children, obey your parents in all things. Obey your parents. They have authority. And you’re supposed to obey. Is it because they own you? What was it Bill Cosby used to say to his son? “I brought you into this world and I can take you out!” Actually, no. I want everybody in this room – I don’t care what’s your age – if you’re five years old and can listen to this, I want you to listen. If you’re a teenager, I want you to listen to this. I want you to listen to the next statement, because this is very, very important. Your parents have authority over you, but sometimes they’re not perfect! And sometimes they’re wrong! Right? And sometimes they’re not fair. And sometimes they don’t understand. And then you say, “Good! I don’t have to obey!” Let me finish the rest of verse 20. Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the Lord. It’s well pleasing to the Lord! God says, “I know they’re not going to be perfect all the time. And I know sometimes, they’re not going to understand, but for there to be peace and harmony in your family, you listen to them. You listen to them. And I will take care of you.” When you get down to it, you obey your parents because you’re owned by God – and because you love your parents. It is because you’re owned by God. You say, “Well, I’m only ten years old.” You’re owned by God. And you have to trust Him and you have to love Him. And, if you trust Him and love Him, obeying your parents becomes easier, because you realize He actually put them in charge.
Now, the civil government doesn’t own us. They do have authority and they get judged very harshly for what they do. I wouldn’t want to be the rulers of this world and come up in the resurrection. I just can’t imagine what that’s going to be like. They are judged very harshly.

You know, parents, we are judged harshly by God, if we do not fulfill our parental roles properly. In fact, look at the next verse – verse 21:

V-21 – Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged.

When we go to Deuteronomy, chapter 6 – Deuteronomy, chapter 6 – we have the command of God of what parents are supposed to do. And parents are supposed to teach their children God’s way! If we, as parents, do not teach our children God’s way – if we come up with a lot of excuses – “Well, we have to let them make their own decisions.” Or, we come up with excuses, “Well, my kid…it’s just too hard,” or “My wife and I, we just work all the time. We’re sorry. Somebody else has to raise our kids.” If we don’t teach them God’s way, then we will reap what we sow as parents, because God gave us the authority to do that! He didn’t give us the authority to say, “Well, we own these kids, so they’re just slaves to us.” He didn’t give us that authority! What He gave us was the authority to teach them Him, because we are owned by Him and they are owned by Him, and it is our authority to teach them His way. That’s what Deuteronomy 6 says! You teach them in the way, you teach them as they walk, as they lie down. You teach them as they work, as they play. You teach them what? You teach them God and His way. That’s the authority we’ve been given. And with that comes the authority, by the way, to force that. Yes, as parents, we have the authority to force our children to obey God.

By the way, the civil government has the authority from God to force certain rules on us. If I’m driving eighty miles an hour and a policeman pulls me over and says, “Hey, it was seventy…here’s a ticket,” he has the authority to give me that the ticket. And I have a responsibility to pay for it. “Yeah, but that’s just arbitrary. There’s no laws in here about speed limits.” There is, though, to obey the authority of the civil government. And I have the responsibility, as a Christian, for conscience sake – that’s what he said in Romans: for conscience sake.

Children, it’s because this pleases God. Do you want God in your life? Then you understand and obey your parents. If we misuse, as parents, our authority, we pay a heavy price. You break a child’s spirit, or you just allow them to sin, or you’re too harsh on them, you could really reap the whirlwind here. When we use it properly and children respond properly, there are happy homes and that becomes generational.

Okay, let’s look at another point. Oh, this one is really tough. In fact, I don’t think I’ve heard a real sermon on this subject for years. Well, I think I gave one, but I think it was six years ago. Colossians 3:18:

V-18 – Wives, submit to your own husbands.

“Okay, we can put up with that our children have to submit, but this is something from the ancient world which is cruel and anti-women. And it means that men are superior.” Actually, it has nothing to do with the quality of men and women. It has to do with the idea that there is delegated authority.

If you have authority over your children, as a mother – because that is given to you by God – yeah, your husband has some authority over you. Now, by the way, I want to stress here that this doesn’t say, “Women, submit to all men.” I’ve known men who have said, “Well, I have authority over all women.” Usually, they’re not married men. There’s a reason they’re not married! Okay? Because they don’t even know what authority is, and they go around telling women what to do, and can’t figure out why nobody wants them. There’s a reason, guy! It doesn’t say that I, as a man, have authority over all women. I do have some authority over my wife. Now, just like all authority, there’s a box. It’s within a box. I go outside that box, guess what I sow? Something really bad. I don’t have authority between my wife and God. I don’t have authority to misuse her, abuse her, or treat her badly. But, submit…I want you to notice the rest of the verse here:

V-18 – Wives, submit to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

Now, whether you are a good citizen, or a child, or a wife, we can look at the civil government, the parents, and the husband, and see where – wow! – they’re never perfect. Ever. There’s never been a perfect husband. Ask my wife. So you do it as unto the Lord. In other words, there’s a point where you say – this is where it’s character – “Okay, in this instance….” Now, there are things in which you don’t submit to your husband. Right? If your husband tells you to disobey God, you don’t do it. If your husband says, “Submit to a beating,” you don’t do it! But there are times when you’re going to submit to your husband and you’re not going to like it. And there will be times when you have to submit to your husband, because there’s been a decision that’s made, and he may even be wrong sometimes. Gasp! A man be wrong? Why do you do it then? Because of your character.

And it’s very interesting…I’ve said this before. I have my heroes in the Bible. Peter is one of my heroes. I just have different people in the Bible.... David is one of my heroes. One of my heroes is Abigail – Abigail, the wife of Nabal. King David – you remember the story – King David was out protecting Israel against marauders. And he protected Nabal’s flocks. Nabal was one of the wealthiest men in all of Israel, but he was also an arrogant fool. In fact, the word Nabal means fool. He was a foolish man. And he was married to – what is described – a very beautiful woman – probably a bad match. She was probably very young. He was much older – probably an arranged marriage. Her parents married her to this wealthy man. But she was very beautiful and very wise, married to a foolish man.

David said, “Send me and my men some food.” Now he has a small army. You have to understand. He has six hundred men. And he said, “I need some food for my army. We’ve been out protecting…we’ve saved your flocks. We’ve saved your property.” And Nabal says, “You’re nothing but a criminal. Don’t show up around my house.” And David lost his temper. He didn’t do it very often, but you know, whenever you lose your temper, you’re, pretty much, irrational. So he takes four hundred of his men and he heads off. He’s going to go into Nabal’s big ranch, where he has dozens – maybe hundreds – of people working for him, and he’s going to kill Nabal. And, of course, what Nabal is going to do is, tell all his servants, “Grab your spears. We’re going to go out and fight against him,” and they know, “We’ll be slaughtered. This is the toughest, best-trained army in the Middle East, and we’re going to go fight these guys?” So some of the servants go to Abigail, and say, “This is what happened.” Abigail says, “Don’t tell my husband. Just get the food together and let’s go.” And she goes out, and there’s that scene where this army…you now, here are these four hundred men on horses – because he left a couple hundred men in the camp – coming down the road, and here’s Abigail with this train of mules and camels, all loaded          down with food, and they meet each other on the road.

Now Abigail is really caught in a problem here. Her husband won’t do something, but he didn’t say she couldn’t, and she knows what the right thing to do is. She knows that when he finds out, he might beat her. He could just treat her terribly. She also knows that David might kill her. She’s caught between two authorities. Now, if I was Abigail, what I would probably have done is, run and hide and said, “Good, I’ll see who comes out the winner here, and probably Nabal will be dead, and David will be leaving, and yeah, I’ll be free of all this stuff.” Instead, she’s facing possible repercussions from both authorities in her life. Abigail bows before David and says, “It would be wrong for you to kill him. How can a king kill a man out of vengeance? This would be wrong before the LORD.” He could have killed her right on the spot. How many kings put up with that? He had the authority to kill her! If he would have, the story of David would be quite different, wouldn’t it? The story of David, in the Bible, would be quite different. Instead, David said, “Thank you. You’re right.” She said, “See here. I brought some food.” He took the food, turned around, and went back. She goes back to her husband – now she’s facing the repercussions of “Now, I must submit to his authority” – she went to her husband and said, “I did this for you. I went ahead and gave him food, because he was coming to kill you.” For Abigail, it would have been better for her husband to be dead, but Abigail understood this – this is where I’m talking about character – she understood what was right. It scared her husband so badly, he died – had a heart attack and died. What’s remarkable is, caught between two authorities – both of them wrong! – she did exactly what was right. Just a little story about her. There’s not much in the Bible about her, but she’s one of my heroes. That’s just brilliant wisdom. David saw it. Her husband didn’t. When Nabal died, David found out, and he said, “Go get that woman. I want to marry her. That’s somebody special right there.”

That’s not easy, wives. It’s not easy being a wife. I know. I’m part of the wife of Jesus Christ. My husband is perfect and it’s not easy for me. It must be hard when you’re married to us. So you do it “as unto the Lord.” Now, that means that you obey God rather than men. Right?

1 Peter 3:5 – I remember I read this at a marriage seminar I did about ten years ago. And we had people come from a number of Sabbath groups. And I had one woman call me – she was from a different Sabbath group – and because I read this, she said it was men like me who had destroyed the United States, because I was so evil. And here’s what I said – verse 5:

1 Peter 3:5 – For in this manner, in former times, the holy women who trusted in God, also adorned themselves, being submissive to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him, “Lord,” whose daughters you are, if you do good and are not afraid of any terror.

So I said, “Notice what they did. They submitted to their husbands. Why?” – remember when I said last week, “There are two things about God’s ownership: we have to trust in His ownership – that He is good – and we have to love Him?” – “they were submissive to their husbands.” Why? Because they trusted in God. See, it’s the same thing. Husbands, we don’t own them. If you think you own your wife, you’re an abusive man. You don’t own them. They are your helper. Right? They are your helper.

Now, the statement I made in that was, “Women, if your husband ever tells you to do something against God – because you are fully equal to your husband – do not obey him. Do not obey your husband if he tells you to do something against God, because you are owned by God. You are a daughter of God. And you are a daughter of God before you are a wife. So, if he tells you to steal, do not steal. If he owns a business and he tells you to be dishonest, do not be dishonest. If he tells you to lie, do not lie.” Oh, this woman was so mad. She said, “I’m told to obey my husband, no matter what. It’s his responsibility.” I said, “You believe that he is superior to you and that you are not a daughter of God.” “No, I believe He has ordered me to obey him.” I said, “It sounds like you probably have a business and he’s having you do things that aren’t legal.” “Yeah, but I have to obey him.” No, not when it’s against God. But when it’s not against God, you have to submit.

We don’t do sermons like this very often anymore. Do you know why? Well, it’s going to offend all the women. That’s all right. I already offended half the men when I told them they have to pay taxes. Right? I already offended half the teenagers when I told them, “You have to obey your parents.” And there are women who are going to be offended by this scripture. It doesn’t say this has to do with the quality of who you are – or equality. It has to do with the delegation of authority. And that authority is always in a box and it always has limits to it – always.

Okay, okay. Who have I not offended? Next principle. Colossians 3:22 – we’ll come back to Peter here in a minute – let’s go to Colossians 3. See why we don’t talk about this? It is hard. It is hard to know, at times, when you submit and when you don’t submit. But the idea that none of us have to submit to anybody…the truth is, all of us submit to somebody and all of us have some authority over somebody – everybody. And the scripture is full of instructions of what to do, in those cases – all under the ownership of God. Colossians 3:22:

Colossians 3:22 – Bondservants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh – not with eye service, as men pleasers, but in sincerity of heart, fearing God.

Okay. Are you an employee and you work in a really bad company? So, does that give us the right to try to sabotage the company? Does it give us the right to not do our work, to drag our feet, to sit around all day long and complain with people about the company? Does it give us the right to do that? Verse 23 – you say, “Boy, that’s hard!”

V-23 – Whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not to men, knowing that, from the Lord, you will receive the reward of inheritance, for you serve the Lord Christ. But he who does wrong will be repaid for what he has done and there is no partiality.

Colossians 4:1 – So masters, give your bondservants what is just and fair, knowing that you have a master in heaven.
Now, once again, just like in all these other situations here – especially in Colossians – Paul starts out with, “Look, you have an employer. You work for that employer, unless, of course, he tells you to do something against God.” Your employer does not own you. Unfortunately, at the time when Paul was writing, there were slaves and they were owned by employers. And some of those slaves were killed because they reached the point where they said, “I have to obey God rather than men.” You and I have never faced…we have faced, maybe, losing our job. “Well, I have to keep my job. My employer told me to work on the Sabbath.” Are you owned by your employer or are you owned by God? See, we have to work this through. “Who owns me? So whose authority trumps all other authority? But otherwise, if my employer tells me to do a job, and he wants it done this way, and it’s totally inefficient – I say, ‘That’s inefficient.’ He says, ‘Shut up and do it this way.’” – as long as it isn’t against God, guess what you do? You do it his way and accept his pay. Either that or don’t accept his pay.

Now, he also says, “Masters – okay, bosses – remember, you mistreat your employees and you will be judged by God.” Do you want to do an interesting study? Go through the entire Old and New Testament and look up all the instructions given to employers. They are frightening. To withhold wages, to mistreat employees, you are directly responsible to God. Just like I know that the way I treat my wife, I am directly responsible to God, and I hope she never has to, someday, go to God and say, “You know the husband You put over me? He’s abusive,” because guess who I am now fighting? Not my wife. That’s the interesting thing. As the child, as the wife, as the citizen, as the employee, we all have direct access to God, and we can bring the scriptures to Him and say, “My husband isn’t doing this right.”

But the important thing is – and I want you to think about this – if I, has a husband, say, “I will only treat my wife with love, I will only be kind to her when she’s submitting to me the way I want,” we all say, “No, that doesn’t work.” You have to love her, you have to try to be kind to her, you have to try to meet her needs even if she is not submitting the way you want. I think everybody would agree with that, obviously, because that’s the way God treats us. So let’s reverse that. So, if I am the wife, I must respect my husband, and I must love my husband even when he, sometimes, is failing as my husband. And I’m not talking about sin, like committing adultery, or something. I’m talking about this relationship between husbands and wives and how sometimes he exercises his authority. Same thing as an employee: I must work with my employer, even though, sometimes, he may be mistreating me. We’ve all been through that. Right? I’ve been through it in the world, when I worked in advertising for years. I’ve been through that in the church! My bosses, usually, have been good ones, but, occasionally, I’ve had a bad one. So we must follow these instructions.

You know, you say, “What if my boss is really mean to me?” 1 Peter 2. You see, once we get into this concept of delegated authority, the first thing we have to establish is that anyone who has authority doesn’t have all authority, and they can’t do certain things. But we also have to understand our responsibility to do this. 1 Peter 2, verse 18:

1 Peter 2:18 – Servants, be submissive to your masters with all fear, not only to the good and the gentle, but also to the harsh. “But can’t I go out and pick at the harsh ones, or, maybe, blow up the shop?” For this is commendable, if for conscience – notice how many times this has to do with conscience towards God – conscience towards God, one endures grief, suffering wrongfully. For what credit is it, if you are beaten for your faults, and you take it patiently? But when you do good and suffer, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God. For to this you were also called, for Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that you should follow His steps.

So, teenager, when your mom and dad can’t remember what it’s like to be sixteen, and they’re not very understanding, and maybe they make a ruling – or make a decision – and it’s just not fair, are you owned by God? Are you willing to suffer wrongfully because you love God and you love your parents? Now, as parents, we say, “Oh good. Teach my kids that,” but are you willing to do it if your employer does that? Are you willing to do it if the governor of Texas does that? “Oh, well, wait a minute! Whoa, whoa, whoa. I’m not going to follow any some unjust law passed by the federal government!” “But it’s not against God.” “I know, but it takes away my rights.” See how difficult this is? Our example should be…wow…we are like Abigail. Abigail had no power at all…well, she had amazing power over the servants. Remember, it was the male servant that came to her. She had lots of power, actually. But with the two men that were about to kill each other, she had no power at all there. But she trusted God. This is hard.

I’d rather give a sermon on how you are the called, and chosen and faithful, and God’s going to give you the Kingdom, and all this that’s very positive. This is hard. This is where Christianity meets some very difficult decisions. And it’s what all of us have to do. It’s not easy.

I’m going to read this section we just read in Colossians in the Phillip’s translations. I usually don’t read the Phillip’s translation, because it’s a paraphrase, but this captures the essence of this.

Colossians 3:18 – Wives, adapt yourselves to your husbands. That is your Christian duty. Husbands, give your wives much love. Never treat them harshly. As for you children, obey your parents in everything, for this is the right and Christian thing to do. Fathers, don’t overcorrect your children or you will take all the heart out of them. Slaves, your job is to obey your human masters, not with the idea of catching their eye or currying favor, but as a sincere expression of your devotion to the Lord. Whatever your task is, put your whole heart and soul into it, as into work done for the Lord and not merely for men, knowing that your real reward will come from Him. You’re actually slaves of the Lord Jesus Christ.

When you put that all together…see, I read the segments of Colossians and I read them separately. There are six verses all put together. When you read them all together, there is a submissive humility that we have to have, even in the face of imperfect human authority. It’s not easy.

The last point I want to make is that there is, at times – and we have to understand – that there is authority in the church. Once again, like all authority, it has purposes given by God and it has limitations. Ephesians. I gave a whole sermon on this here about…oh, I guess it was about a year and a half ago. So I’ll just read over it. Ephesians 4:11 – this is the purpose.

Ephesians 4:11 – He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints – in order for the church to grow – for each individual to have the gifts that God gives every one of us – to have them developed, to have the fruit of the Spirit developed in every one of us, for us to be the family of God – for the edifying of the body of Christ – verse 13 – till we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro, carried about by every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men, or the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head, Christ, from whom the whole body joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working, by which every part does its share, causes growth in the body for the edifying of itself in love.

You’ll see in the New Testament where there are times where in 3 John, there was an elder that was actually telling people to disobey God. And John said, “Don’t listen to him! If he tells you to disobey God, I’ll fix that when I show up!” So this doesn’t mean…just like any authority…you’re always going to find everybody doing it exactly right. In fact, one of the things that always makes me uncomfortable is sections of scripture like Titus 1. Let’s go to Titus, chapter 1, and verse 5. Paul tells Titus here…he says:

Titus 1:5 – “I left you in Crete for a purpose” – Paul and Titus had gone into Crete, and he said, “You stay, because I want you to do something.” I left you in Crete…that you should set in order the things that are lacking and appoint elders in every city as I command you: If a man is blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of dissipation – or you know, wrong living, wild living – or insubordination…. Interesting, one of the things for an elder is, an elder has to also live under authority. In fact, the reason why is, if you go down to verse 10…well, verse 9 says:

V-9 – Holding fast the faithful word, as he has been taught, that he may be able, by sound doctrine, both to exhort and convict those who contradict, for there are many insubordinate, both idle talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision, whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert entire households, teaching things which they ought not for the sake of dishonest gain.

Sometimes, someone will say, “Well, I want to tell people that they don’t have to keep the Sabbath.” And the elders say, “No, you can’t go around and tell people that.” “Well, I want to tell them this,” or “I want to tell them…. No, what right do you have to tell me what I can talk to people about in the church.” That right.

But, do you know what really scares me about Titus? I look at verse 6, and verse 7, verse 8, verse 9 – all the qualifications of an elder – and I have never met an elder yet that’s perfect in all those things – have not met one. I am not one. We try, but we’re not perfect. You figured that out a long time ago. Right? And here, we have to try to carry out what we’re supposed to do not being perfect. It’s not always easy, even, to submit to the leadership in the church, because it’s not always perfect. It’s not always perfect.

And sometimes there will be leaders in any position…sometimes there are husbands who leave the faith. Right? They become abusive. Sometimes there are elders who leave the faith. Sometimes there are parents who leave the faith. I’ve seen children stay in the faith and their parents leave the faith. And yet, we all have to live, both as the people, sometimes, who have authority and, sometimes, as the people who don’t. And we all switch roles, depending on what we’re doing in life. And we all rule in an imperfect way. And the Bible – especially the New Testament – has an awful lot of explanation of how that is to work. But it’s not always what we like. That’s why you just don’t hear this talked about much, right? – all these different subjects – you just don’t hear them talked about much.

People have asked me, “Well, what if the government came and said, ‘Give us all your gold and silver?’” I’d give them my gold and silver. The gold and silver I have isn’t worth much, so.... “What if they said, ‘Give us your Bible?’” I’d say, “You can’t have it,” but I wouldn’t shoot them for it. I don’t have the authority to do that. But I wouldn’t give it to them, because this is God’s. Do you see the difference? You have to understand. Do you remember Jesus, “Whose picture is on the coin? Caesar’s? Well, give that to Caesar.” Right? “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s.” He can’t have this. It’s not theirs. Tough decisions, isn’t it? Sometimes, we’ll give them the Bible, but we’ll keep the coin. “Okay, you can have my Bible. You just can’t have my money.” As Christians, it’s the opposite.

Cooperation with human authority has nothing to do with your superiority or inferiority of other people. It has nothing to do with “I gave you life. I can take it away” – like Bill Cosby used to say. I actually knew – I hate to say this – this was like fifty years ago – I knew an elder who actually said , “I gave you God’s Spirit” to somebody. “I gave you God’s Spirit. I can take it away.” No he can’t. First of all, he didn’t give it. I’ve laid hands on lots of people, watched them receive God’s Spirit, and I never gave anybody God’s Spirit. I just laid hands on them, because God said to do it that way. God gives His Spirit and no man can take it. Now God can take it. God can take it, but that’s something totally different.

When Jesus traveled to Jerusalem at age twelve and his parents couldn’t find Him, and when they did find Him, He said, “Well, I’m supposed to be in the temple doing My Father’s business.” And they said, “No, you’re supposed to be with us. You’re still under age.” And you notice, Jesus submitted to them. Jesus submitted to His parents. Why? Because, until He was of age, they had authority over Him. The Creator of the universe understood that His parents had the delegated authority over Him until He reached a certain age. And He obeyed His parents. Interesting, isn’t it? That’s an important lesson – just from His example.

Let’s go to 1 Corinthians 15 and look at how this all ends, because I tell you what, this whole subject is difficult, no matter where you are in this. As a parent, sometimes you think, “Oh, I have such responsibility!” and it weighs on you. As an employer, it weighs on you. As husbands…I fear, sometimes, as husbands, it doesn’t weigh on us as much as it should – that we need to be very, very careful how we treat our wives, as the daughters of God. 1 Corinthians 15:24:

1 Corinthians 15:24 – Then comes the end – this is after Christ comes and He reigns on earth for a thousand years – when He – speaking of Christ – delivers the kingdom to God, the Father, and He puts an end to all rule and all authority and all power. For He must reign until He has put all enemies under His feet. And the last enemy that will be destroyed is death. For He has put all things under His feet. But when He says all things are put under Him, it is evident that He who put all things under Him is accepted. In other words, all things are put under the power of Jesus Christ, except, of course, the Father. What does Jesus do with everything some day? He gives it all to the Father, including all authority. It’ll be easy then, because God will be all in all. We will live under His authority.

But until then, we don’t. Until then, you and I live in a difficult time, when Satan has been given a right to have evil reign on the earth for a short period of time, and authority has been delegated to civil governments, to parents, to husbands, to employers, to elders of the church – imperfect people helping lead other imperfect people. That’s what we live in. That’s what we’re supposed to submit to. That’s what we learn from. And there will come a time when God will take all authority to Himself.

So, be a good citizen. Be a good husband and wife. Be good parents and children. Be a good employee and a good employer. If you have any position in the church, serve well. Remember, you are responsible to God. If we have to submit in any way, submit well, because you are responsible to God.