Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.
- Romans 13:1
“In his sermon Mayhew avowed that Paul’s command to be subject to governing authorities did not imply blanket submission to tyrants. Based on his understanding of Romans 13, we are to be under the authority of the government, but the government itself is to respect the higher authority of God. When a government exercises power apart from God’s oversight, we have an obligation to resist. Mayhew put it like this:
“[Romans 13] urges the duty of obedience from this topic of argument, that civil rulers, as they are supposed to fulfill the pleasure of God, are the ordinance of God. But how is this an argument for obedience to such rulers as do not perform the pleasure of God, by doing good; but the pleasure of the devil, by doing evil; and such as are not, therefore, God’s ministers, but the devil’s! …
“When once magistrates act contrary to their office … when they rob and ruin the public, instead of being guardians of its peace and welfare; they immediately cease to be the ordinance and ministers of God; and no more deserve that glorious character, than common pirates and highwaymen.
“Fifteen years later Mayhew, forty-five, preached another seditious sermon on a blistering August afternoon in 1765. Sitting in Mayhew’s Boston congregation were clandestine members of the Sons of Liberty. The day after his sermon a mob attacked the mansion of Thomas Hutchison, the British governor of Massachusetts Bay Province. Hutchison and his family escaped harm, and Mayhew condemned the violence.
“Mayhew died the next year of an illness. He was only forty-six, but his published sermons were papers that kindled the fires of the American Revolution, which erupted ten years to the week after his death.”
- Robert J. Morgan, 100 Bible Verses That Made America
In my recent trip to visit the grandchildren, the oldest of them went with me to Nashville, to sell used books and games. One of the books that I purchased in return was 100 Bible Verses That Made America by Robert J. Morgan. As we approach the 250th anniversary of the birth of the USA, I thought I would do a condensed mini-series on some of these verses, four posts per week for a few weeks – maybe not all 100 verses.
On the 250th Anniversary of the birth of the USA, I have struggled with this verse.
It seems a lot like other verses. We are to honor our parents, be subject to civil authorities, etc.
There are no conditions about them being good leaders. We must show respect.
In a panel discussion among pastors, I heard one pastor give a good circumstance for rebellion. If we are forced to do things against God’s Law. In that, we are subject to a higher power than any earthly power.
But with all the oppression, all the taxing of the people, making the colonists pay for the kings’ mistakes and extravagances…
If we put all that together, are we in the area of clearly seeing the king of England as someone who was serving the Devil?
But the sermon, with excerpt above, was printed and copied. Jonathan Mayhew’s sermon was the most influential sermon in pre-revolution America. John Adams, fourteen when the sermon was first preached, read the sermon over and over again. John Adams was a devout Christian, and as he grew up under the English tyranny, he interpreted the actions against the colonists of crossing that line.
Note however that Jonathan Mayhew condemned the violence after the Sons of Liberty attacked the British governor.
But I went to school when there was prayer in school, prayer over the intercom to each classroom. I even took an elective one entire year in high school, studying the entire Bible from cover to cover. In a public school. And we did not have lessons on evolution in school. We studied true science, things that could be measured.
And for the most part, those things have disappeared without much of a fight.
The civil unrest today stems largely from our government ignoring the founding fathers.
And we have clear lines on some of the issues where God’s Law is being violated.
But I think we need revival more than allowing anarchy to reign.
But is it too late?
Soli Deo Gloria. Only to God be the Glory.
Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley 
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