**Guest post from Deacon Jered Leslie.
Saints, we have failed to uphold Paul’s words in romans 13: verse 1. … yes you heard me correctly.
Saints, we are guilty of failing to obey his command, but not in the way you may be thinking and certainly not in the way the world would have you believe.
Paul writes to the church in Rome.
Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. – Romans 13:1
The great thing about his verse is that it is clear and simple in its original context. Paul is most likely writing to the Christians in Rome during the reign of Claudius Caesar. And during the era of the Caesars, the supreme authority of Rome and of the Roman world was what they called the imperium; the law of the Caesar. Under this imperium, Roman governors and officials were vested with authority from Caesar and served at his pleasure. They were appointed by him to rule and govern as the hand of Caesar himself. Therefore, Paul is echoing the same thing that Christ taught to his disciples. Don’t fight Rome, do not fight against your Roman authorities. God has placed them over you as your governing authorities. Pretty clear.
But we do not live in first century Rome and if we assume our present context is identical to theirs, then we commit eisegesis.
So how are we failing to obey our governing authorities?
We must be reminded of who, in fact, is our governing authority as American citizens. The authority, that according to romans 13:1, God has instituted over us.
Do we have a Caesar? No.
Is jay Inslee your governing authority? No, he is not. Was Trump or is Biden our governing authority? No.
Who then is our authority? It turns out that we have the same governing authority as they do, the authority that they are sworn to support and defend; the Constitution.
And the Constitution is very clear that it is the supreme governing authority.
Article 6 reads;
“This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.”
That last phrase means if a state law is contrary to, or violates, the federal Constitution, then that state law is not legitimate. Thus, the U.S. Constitution remains the supreme law of the land .
It continues…
“The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the individual States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution.”
Saints, we have forgotten what our real governing authority is, just like our representatives have forgotten what they are sworn to support.
Now, If Paul is correct, then God has instituted our U.S. Constitution as our governing authority to which we are subject.
So, how can we be subject to men who are subject to the same thing we are? They are subject to the same authority that we are.
We have abdicated our true governing authority and let godless men control us as though they wielded power. And By doing this, we have violated Romans 13:1. We are not subject to our true governing authority. Rather we are subjecting ourselves to men who have no authority at all.
The fact that this is not common knowledge is to our shame. So, saints if you are willing, let us kneel and confess our sins of failure to be subject to our true authority.
Locusts and Wild Honey 