The Devotional - A Look at the Book #685

by Jesse Abel

The Devotional – A Look at the Book #685

I am told that if something is not broken, that there is no need to fix it! Yet there is wiggle room for a tweak or two and we call that preventive maintenance. It would seem that in this nation, we have tweakened in all the wrong places and weakened the backbone of our national Constitution.

Reading through Romans 13 this morning I was struck with this thought. “Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. Now if you listen to the conversations of the people around you, you know that we are missing the mark intended by the apostle Paul. Even if we took the time to listen to our own mouth we would be shocked (I think!) about the things we pour through our teeth and at what we allow to pass through our lips.

The elections for this nation’s leaders are once again on the horizon. The jaws of people all over this country are working overtime seeking to push their point of view, agenda or candidate into the front and crown him or her as one of the next leaders. We spend large sums of money as well, words and money all for naught! Notice Romans 13:1.The authority in place is there and appointed by God. Do we really believe that? I think not!

Romans 13… read it again. I see that our governing authorities are corrupt, but not because God put corrupt people in because He is cruel, but because we forced our will over His, just as the Israelites did when they wanted a democracy over them rather than a theocracy as they had. 1 Samuel 10:17-27. Now it is not my intention to go into all the argument that focuses on democracies and theocracies; I see the hand writing on the wall just as you do as nations today seek to force their religious law on weak nations that cannot resist.

This does bring up the next section in Romans 13. Our land is full of adultery, theft, and false witness and coveting. The Holy Bible clearly states that this kind of debauchery is not a result of having no law, but of having no love for one another. Notice; love does not harm the neighbor. Have you or I harmed your neighbor lately, physically or verbally; spiritually or mentally?

For the unbelieving… we may feel that they have an excuse since we can say that they do not know any better. But I believe that we have been saying things like this far too long. Yes we may say that they may not know any better, (maybe only to join them) but they do know better because the scripture says earlier in Romans that these unbelieving people are a law unto themselves. Romans 2:14, so there is no excuse for the unbelieving just as there is no excuse for the believing.

Is there a problem then with God, His Law or mankind’s law? I have to use the words of the apostle here; “Certainly not” Romans 11:1 just as God has not cast of the Israelite, He has not cast off the believer either; but the believer who can make a difference in the nation, the laws of the nation and the leaders of the nation have cast of Christ. Say what? Just read Romans 13 again and especially Romans 13:11-14.