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WHAT ABOUT ROMANS 13?

A brother in the Lord recently texted me asking about Romans 13. What do you say to someone who takes this passage to mean, "If the government mandates the vaccine and we don't take it, then are we against God?" Here was my response:

Romans 13 is an excellent place to prove that God has established the position of governing authorities in general. But it is not a blanket endorsement of those who hold those positions of authority, nor a command to 'do evil that good may come.'

After Noah got off the ark, God gave him and his family (all humanity on the earth at the time) the authority to establish government for law and order (Genesis 9).

They were given the right to take a human life for capital crimes and to execute justice. This was a huge blessing since the world before the flood was horribly violent due to the 'might makes right' mentality that dominated the earth. So it was the early and rudimentary power that God gave and established for mankind.

Later in Israel's history, He gave them detailed laws and other civil orders, expanding a model of good government.

In a similar way, God reaffirms that the roles and offices of government are given and prescribed by God for good. Government as well as law enforcement was given by God and meant for good.

This is the issue in Romans 13. If governments do evil (and they often do), are we commanded to obey and follow them by doing evil ourselves?

Absolutely not. Let me give you some examples.

Remember the midwives in Exodus 1 who were supposed to commit abortions on the Hebrew babies, but they refused? They even lied about it, but it says God blessed them for it.

What about Daniel, who was commanded by the edict not to pray (Daniel 6)? What did he do? He disobeyed the governing authority.

Or what about earlier in Daniel 3 when the king commanded the Hebrews to bow to an image? What did they do? They refused and were thrown into the fiery furnace.

They disobeyed an evil order from the government. This shows us that there is sanctified civil disobedience in the Bible.

Another example is that of the Maccabees who lived in the 2nd century BC. They defied the foreign king Antiochus Epiphanes and even violently rebelled, overthrew his rule over them, and even killed many unfaithful Jews in the process. The Maccabees regained their country and restored the true worship of God. I believe these Jewish fighters were prophesied of in Daniel 11:32 as "the people who know their God shall be strong and carry out great exploits." Those incredible events led to the feast of lights (also called Feast of Dedication or Hanukkah in Hebrew) which Jesus celebrated in John 10.

In the New Testament, the religious authority commanded Peter and John to stop preaching about Jesus (Acts 4). They refused to obey, saying, "you judge whether it's right to obey God or man."

You see, Romans 13 is written to tell us that God has created the positions of authority for good, not for evil. If they do evil and enforce corruption, we are duty-bound to resist it in Jesus' name. Otherwise, all those Nazi soldiers who gassed people could say (as they did), "I was just following orders."

Millions of Christians were killed in the first centuries of church history. Why were they martyred? Was it for worshipping Jesus No. Not exactly.

The Romans worshiped everything and didn't care that some people worshiped a man they claimed rose from the dead. 'So what?' they thought, 'We worship a man too, Caesar.' But you see, Christians would not take a small pinch of incense and offer it, saying 'Caesar is lord.' They refused to obey the government, and that was civil disobedience.

This is crucial. The early Christians were killed for civil disobedience. Their living, vibrant faith caused them to be considered enemies of the state.

Today we face the same thing: a government that has become evil and oppressive, and even with the positions of authority granted to it by God, it demands that people do something that amounts to a little pinch. They want you to bow to the narrative, essentially saying, "Caesar is lord."

The early founders of our country were faced with the same challenge. How could they justify rebelling or standing apart from England? They explained it in the Declaration of Independence, but they also had some sayings that reflected their well-considered position. One of the battle cries was the opposite of what the Jews said who delivered Jesus to Pilate, saying 'we have no king but Caesar.' Our forefathers said, "We have no king but Jesus!" That was sedition to England but faithfulness to our first citizens.

Another phrase they used was; "Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." This was not a flippant slogan but a saying that came from a well-thought-out philosophy of government from our betters when it comes to Bible knowledge.

Now consider those who would convince you to get the jab compliant with government, which fulfills Romans 13 as they see it. Could they not make the same argument for the mark of the beast? After all, the global antichrist system will be a ‘governing authority.’ According to that reasoning, all government commands must be obeyed blindly without reference to common sense or the biblical precedence that proves otherwise. Many people wonder if these vaccination rollouts are in preparation for such a system. I believe these rollouts are just the sort of conditioning that will precede that damnable mark.

It’s for these reasons (and more) that we do not use Romans 13 as a cloak for complicity or complacency. Neither this nor any other passage is an injunction of God to embrace the diabolical vaccine narrative. It is truly better to obey God rather than men.