04.36. LESSON 36

LESSON 36

Romans 12:1-21 closes with exhortations concerning the treatment of enemies. When Christians live their religion, neither enmity among themselves nor peace with the world is possible, for "All that would live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution" (2 Timothy 3:12). The world demands conformity: it punishes those who fall below and persecutes those who rise above its standards. The only way for Christians to avoid the enmity of the world, that crucified their Lord and have never repented of the crime, is to become worldly themselves. "If the world hate you, ye know it hated me before it hated you... I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you" (John 15:18-19). The world hated Christ because his word and life condemned its evil works (John 3:19-21), and the word and life of his disciples likewise arouse the hatred of the world, for they also must condemn its humanism, sensuality, pride, greed, envy, and lust for power.

"Avenge not yourselves, beloved, but give place unto the wrath of God: for it is written, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense saith the Lord." Peter says that Christ’s own life is an example of this way of living: "Christ suffered also for you, leaving you an example, that ye should follow his steps... who, when he was reviled, revileth not again... but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously" (1 Peter 2:21-23). Peter and Paul exhort us to follow Christ, who always obeyed God and left his enemies, absolutely, for God to recompense. That evildoers be recompensed is morally right and necessary, but God does not permit Christians to usurp his prerogative of administering vengeance.

If we try to mete punishment to our enemies, by reason of our sin-warped, passion beclouded thinking, partial knowledge, and incapacity to know hearts, we are unable to do it right. Probably another reason we are not to avenge ourselves is that the very effort would further demoralize and harden us. On the human level, evil is not the answer to evil; rather, evil breeds evil. We should be happy to leave it to him who can judge "righteously" for all concerned. The only way to be rid of enemies is to melt their hostility with kindness. The logic of kindness is stronger than the logic of argument, or of force—men cannot be coerced into love. When I retaliate and become the enemy of my enemy, God’s wrath rests upon us both. Instead of being overcome by evil, we must be conquerors, overcoming evil with good—this is Christian vengeance and victory.

God’s Two Governments In Romans 12:1-21, Paul exhorts Christians in God’s spiritual kingdom, the church, to overcome evil with good, to do all they do in love, and to let God avenge their wrongs. Continuing the subject of vengeance in Romans 13:1-14, he reveals that God ordains civil government, the state, "As an avenger for wrath to him that doeth evil." The church and the state are both, therefore, divine institutions, but God uses them in different ways for different ends. The church evangelizes and in grace pardons; the state arrests and in justice punishes. In the church, Christians are active leaders; in the state, Christians are but passive subjects. A thumbing through the Bible shows why these two governments are needed. God originally governed man through immediate, personal, spiritual communion with him. This perfect government soon began to work imperfectly, however, because man’s sin separated him from God. This form of government, nevertheless, continued until God’s holiness could no longer endure man’s unholiness, and he destroyed all men except Noah and his family. God would not permit men to avenge Abel’s murder (Genesis 4:15), and he used no human agency in the Noachian flood.

One change God made in the government of the new world after the Flood was to give men the authority to execute murderers: "Whosoever sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed" (Genesis 9:6). God was not abdicating to let men take over government, but merely letting them, as his representatives, exercise some authority which heretofore he had kept to himself personally. But Nimrod, the beginning of whose kingdom was Babel (Genesis 10:10), and many others broke away from God and established their own kingdoms. The first centralization of power, consolidation of humanity in rebellion to God, and dream of godless world empire was the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1-32). As the race was again descending into the depravity that culminated in the Flood, God "Scattered them abroad from thence (Babel) upon the face of the earth," according to his first plan for men (Genesis 1:28-31).

Origin of Civil Government

God called Abraham out of this godless confusion and made him head of a nation in which to establish his government, and to set forth the relationship between the divine element and the human element in government. When he settled this nation in Canaan as his peculiar people, he gave it a government without the civil organization of other nations. The authority he delegated to it, including the death penalty, was vested in religious elders and judges. But the nation rebelled against God’s simple, spiritual sufficient way and said to Samuel, the judge whom God had given them: "Make us a king to judge us like other nations" (1 Samuel 8:1-22). When Samuel sought counsel of God, God answered: "Hearken unto... the people... for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me that I should not be king over them." Consequently, against his primary will, but with his permissive, secondary will, as he suffered divorce among the Jews because of the hardness of their heart though from the beginning it had not been so (Matthew 19:8), God modified his government, and made Saul the first king of Israel. Is it not clear that the root of civil government springs out of the soil of disobedience and rebellion to God?

After a checkered history under many kings, mostly defeat and disaster, as the nation staggered into final Assyrian captivity, God chided: "Where now is thy king?... I have given you a king in my anger and have taken him away in my wrath" (Hosea 13:10-11). Thus, the Jews by rejecting God’s first-choice government brought utter ruin upon themselves. Does not their history exemplify the Scripture, "He gave them their request, but sent leanness into their soul" (Psalms 106:15)? When will men learn that God’s primary spiritual government meets all human needs, and that they do not need a secondary political government?

Questions