This
week, we are asking the question "If government was designed by God to
represent Him in a way that promotes good for people and punishes the evil of
people; if we are to seek to influence government towards its divine design and
towards the message and teachings of Jesus; then what kind of government is the
right government?"
Yesterday,
we looked at what is referred to in church mumbo jumbo talk as a Biblical world
view. We discovered that a world view is a mental map, so to speak that one
uses to help navigate the world effectively. A worldview is that a worldview is
a prism through which we look at the world so as to help us analyze, interpret
and respond to what is occurring around us.
So when
we use the phrase, a “Biblical world view” we are referring to using the
message and teachings of Jesus and the letters that make up the Bible as the
roadmap to navigate the world. When we use the phrase, a “Biblical world view”
we are referring to using the message and teachings of Jesus and the letters
that make up the Bible as the prism by which we look at the world around us so
as to help us analyze, interpret and respond to what is occurring around us.
We
discovered that a Biblical worldview maintains that the world began as a result
of the Creative actions of God as the Creator and that the One true God reveals
Himself and His moral standards clearly in the letters that have been preserved
and recorded for us in the Bible.
A
Biblical worldview maintains that the answer to the question "What went
wrong? What is the source of evil and suffering? Why is there war and conflict?”
is that what went wrong is we went wrong. All humanity has a selfish bent to
love ourselves over God and that selfishness leads us to reject the
relationship with God that we were created for. And part of that selfishness
and rebellion is to reject and rebel against the clear moral standards that
have been provided by us by God in the letters that make up the Bible.
Thus, human
nature, at its core, is driven by selfishness that results in us being flawed,
fallen and broken people. Human beings are also responsible for their actions,
because we were created by God to live lives of responsibility, but reject that
responsibility to do things that are irresponsible. And a as result of the
selfish bent that human beings have to live rebellious and irresponsible lives,
God created the institution of government to represent Him in a way that
promotes good for people and punishes the evil of people.
Finally,
a Biblical worldview maintains that there is nothing that any human being can
do, in their own power to restore the relationship with God that they were
created for as a result of the selfishness and rebellion that has separated
them from God. Instead, God initiated the process of making things right again
by sending His unique one of a kind son, Jesus Christ, as God in a bod, to
enter into humanity to live the life we were created to live but refused to
live, and then willingly allowed Himself to be treated as though He lived our
selfish and sinful lives so that God the Father could treat us as though we
lived Jesus perfect life. And there will be a day when Jesus will return to set
the world right again and usher in the kingdom of Heaven in the fullest sense.
Today,
with the framework of a Biblical view in mind as a roadmap to help us navigate
life here on earth, let’s use that roadmap, to address the question of what kind
of government is the right government from a Biblical perspective. When we read
the letters that make up the Bible, we discover that there is not an explicit
command or teaching when it comes to how governments should be chosen. There is
no single verse that we can point to that says “Thus saith the Lord, you shall
be governed by X type of government”.
With that
being said, there are several principles in the letters that make up the Bible
that can help us to understand the answer to this question. So to begin to
answer that question, let’s take a minute and look at a section of a letter
that is recorded for us in the Old Testament of the Bible, called the book of
Genesis, beginning in Genesis 1:26-27:
Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image,
according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over
the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every
creeping thing that creeps on the earth." God created man in His own
image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.
Here we see the Triune God’s design and desire for the
creation of humanity: “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our
likeness”. To be created in the image of God means that every human being bears
the thumbprint of God. We were created in God’s relational image. We were
created for relationships. Just as God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit
live in relationship with one another, we were created for relationships. We
were created for a relationship with God vertically and for relationships with
one another horizontally. That is why the most devastating feeling is that of
loneliness, because we are living outside of God’s design for our lives.
But not only were we divinely designed for relationships.
Here we also see that we were divinely designed to rule over the earth as God’s
representative. When God uses the phrase “let them rule” this phrase literally
means to have rule or dominion. God created humanity and placed humanity on
earth as His representative on earth. You see, we have been divinely designed
to live in relationship with God and one another and have been given
responsibility over the earth as His representative here on earth.
Now, if every human being is created in God’s relational
image and bears the thumbprint of God as His representative here on earth, how
should that impact what type of government lines up with the message and
teachings of Jesus? If every human being is created equal in
the image of God, then should anyone think they should have a special right to
rule over others without their consent?
In
addition, if the message and teachings of Jesus in the letters that make up the
Bible clearly teach that human beings have this inward bent towards selfishness
and rebellion so that they act on in a way that hurts God and others, then what
keeps kings and rulers from abusing their power if there is not some type of
accountability to the people who are governed by kings or rulers? If, as we
discovered in the first sermon in this series in Romans 13:4, one of the
purposes of government is to be God’s servant for our good, then who is best
suited to choose who should do this for them?
Does
communism, or socialism, or a dictatorship, or monarchy line up with any of
these Biblical principles or a biblical worldview? Are not the people who are
to be served by government the ones who are best suited to choose who should govern
them? You see, while there is no single verse that we can point to that says
“Thus saith the Lord, you shall be governed by X type of government”, there are
biblical principles that support some form of a government that is chosen by
the people who are being governed.
Now a natural question or objection that
could arise here is “Well Dave, didn’t the Jewish people have kings over them?
Didn’t God give the Jewish people a procedure when it came to having a king? So
how can you say that the Bible supports some form of a government that is
chosen by the people who are being governed? ”
Friday,
we will respond to this question or objection by looking at an event from
history that is recorded for us in the Bible called the book of 1 Samuel...
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