About Jesus    Steve Sweetman

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Chapter 13

chapter  12    chapter  14

ch. 13:1-7     ch. 13:8-14

Submission To Authorities  (ch. 13:1 – 7)

In chapter 13 Paul continues on with the practical outworking of our faith in the world around us.  He says “to submit” yourselves to the governing authorities.  The Greek word “hupotasso” is a military word that means to “rank under”, thus to submit or subject oneself to another. For interest sake, in Eph. 5:21 Paul says “to submit to one another”. Then in Eph. 5:22 he says “wives, submit to your husbands”.  In both cases the Greek word “hupotasso”, to rank under, is used.

Let us look at some history around the time Paul wrote these words.  Around 49 AD, about 8 years before Paul wrote Romans,  Claudius, Emperor of the Roman Empire, began to expel Jews from Rome , whether they were Christian Jews or non-Christian Jews.  Some non-Christian Jews were trying to mount an insurrection against Rome . This is one reason why Claudius wanted the Jews out of Rome .

The raging debate between Christian and non-Christian Jews over the resurrection of Jesus bothered Claudius as well.  He was so bothered that he passed a law saying that no one could tamper with a grave.  He did this because of the non-Christian Jews.  They were still spreading the erroneous news that the disciples took Jesus’ body from the grave and then claimed that He rose from the dead.  Claudius was concerned about grave tampering, thus made it a crime, with great punishment for those caught tampering with any grave. 

There was also some false teaching being spread within the Christian community saying that Christians did not have to submit themselves to the civil authority since they had already submitted themselves to Jesus, the King of all authority.  This also was displeasing to Claudius.

So you can see that both Christian and non-Christian Jews were under great stress from the Roman authorities, giving them good reason in their eyes to rebel against and fear Claudius and his government. 

When Paul wrote these words Nero was Emperor of the Roman Empire .  He was a very mean and vicious person, which makes what Paul says here more interesting. Paul was telling these Christians to submit to this tyrant.

Paul, who had already been persecuted by the Roman government clearly says to submit to that same government because “it has been established by God” (ch. 13:1)  He goes on to say, “if you rebel against the authorities, then you are rebelling against that which God has set up and therefore you will duly receive your punishment”. Therefore government is an earthly entity authorized by God Himself to keep justice and peace on earth”.  Now this does not mean that government is always right.  God also gave Adam dominion over the earth to rule over it, and he did not use his authority properly. 

If you read Old Testament Jewish history, one thing you will notice is that God sets up kingdoms for a specific reason and He cuts them down for specific reasons.  For example, God caused Babylon to rise to power so that she could overcome Israel and take Israel captive, which was God's intent in the judgment of Israel .  Later God punished Babylon for doing His will in capturing Israel but having the Persian overcome them.  The Roman government in Paul's day was clearly an empire like Babylon and Persia .  God would used Rome , not too many years after Paul wrote these words to judge Israel again.  This judgment is seen when Rome demolished Jerusalem and caused the Jews to flee throughout the world.  Many Jews were killed trying to flee.  So in this sense of the word, the Roman government that Paul speaks of here was put their by God Himself.           

The authorities, as Paul puts it, are there to punish those who do wrong.  Therefore if you do good, then you should not fear them.  The authorities are “God’s agents” on earth to punish the wrongdoer. (ch. 13:4)  Once again, because of this we should submit ourselves to the authorities.  Paul adds another reason in verse 5 as to why we should submit.  He says we should submit “for the sake of our conscience”.  Our conscience needs to be clean before the Lord.

Paul closes this section by saying that we should pay our taxes, give honour and respect and whatever else is due to the governing officials.

Yet with all that we have just said there are instances in the Bible where some did not always obey the governing agents.  In Acts 4 Peter and John were told by the authorities not to speak in the name of Jesus any longer.  What was their response? “Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God’s sight to obey you rather than God.  For we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard”. (Acts 4:19)  I believe Paul would do the same.  Paul would pay taxes and give to the government what was due them.  Yet he would not forsake the gospel.  Where the two clashed, he would be on the side of the gospel    So the conclusion to be made here is to obey the authorities, but when the authorities step beyond their God given sphere of responsibility, and demand you to do something that is against God’s rule, then at that point you respectfully disobey and pay the consequences.  If you obey the authorities “in good conscience” as long as you can, then when you need to disobey, you will be able to disobey “in good conscience” as well.   

Love For The Day Is Near (ch. 13:8 – 14)

Romans 13:8 in the KJV says, “owe no man anything”.  The NIV puts it this way, “let no debt remain outstanding”.  I like the way the NIV puts it.  The KJV seems to suggest that you should not owe any man anything at all.  Many over the years  have seemed to relate this to money, and as a result say that we are not to owe anyone money.  I feel the point goes far beyond just money.

Verse 8 must be understood in light of verse 7, where Paul tells us to pay our taxes, and to give respect and honour to whom it may be due.  With this in mind we can see that we need to pay those we owe money to, give honour to those we need to honour, and respect those we need to respect.  We are not to fall behind in any of these areas, as well as other areas.  Paul is talking about more than just money.  That being said, when it comes to money and debt, debt is like sin.  It is a heavy burden. 

If we restrict verse 8 to just money, and understand it in light of how the KJV may seem to suggest, that is, “owe no man any money”, or “don’t borrow money”, then any of us who have a mortgage or a credit card is in sin. Does this verse really say, not to borrow money?  The NIV says, “let no debt remain outstanding”.  This is a different point altogether.  What I believe Paul is saying is, if we have borrowed money, then pay it back.  If we have borrowed anything, then give it back.  Therefore if we have borrowed $30,000.00 to buy a house and agree to pay $300.00 a month until it is paid back, then we are doing nothing wrong.  If we get behind in our monthly payments, then we are “letting our debt be outstanding”, and that is where Paul’s words come in.  He says not to let that happen.  If for some reason we fall into hard times, to keep the spirit of these words, we do not ignore our debt, we communicate with our debtor and try to make other arrangements. 

Is the Bible against borrowing money?  What did Jesus say? In Mat. 5:42 Jesus says, “do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you”.  Therefore Jesus is not against the idea of lending money.  If He is not against lending money, He most likely is not against borrowing money. Another interesting verse is found in Ex. 22:25 where it says, “if you lend money to one of my people who is needy, do not be like the money lenders, charge him no interest”.  Here we see what God’s command to the Jews was.  Here we see something of the nature of God as well.  That is, if you lend to the poor, then show love towards him by charging no interest.  So by these two scriptures we can see that the Bible does not say we should not borrow or lend money.  Romans 13:8 does not tell us not to lend or borrow money. It tells us not to get behind in our obligation to others, whether it be financially or in any other way.

There is one debt that Paul tells us to have though, and it is the continuing debt to love.  If we do that, then you have fulfilled the underlying reason for the Law.  The commandment may be “don’t kill, or don’t covet”.  Whatever the command, it is all summed up in, “love your neighbour as yourself”.

“Love your neighbour as yourself”.  Is Paul telling us here that we need to love ourselves before we can love our neighbour?  Is he encouraging us to love ourselves?  No.  He’s certainly not.  Paul knows that it is human nature to love ourselves.  He knows that we think of ourselves first, as selfish as that might be.  He is saying, we should love others as we love ourselves.  We should put others first, because we normally put ourselves first.        The teaching that seems so prevalent today that says we need to learn to love ourselves first before we can love others is hardly what the Bible says.  It is human nature to love and think of ourselves first.  It is not human nature to lay aside our own selfishness to love another, but that is what Paul is telling the Romans to do.  There is no hint in the Bible that we should have all of our “self help” classes to improve our own self awareness.  Jesus, in Mark 8:35 tells us that whoever will save his life will loose it,  but whoever loses his life will save it.    

In verse 10 Paul once again says that if you love, you will fulfill the Law because you won’t do things like killing and stealing that hurt others.  At this point he is not trying to take sides between the Law and love.  He is just saying, if you love, you won’t need to worry about the Law because you will be fulfilling it. 

In verse 11 Paul says that “it is time to wake up … for our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed”.  There is a lot said in this short sentence.  Paul is saying that we can be saved Christians but also be in a state of slumber when it comes to our faith.  Might I suggest that we have a lot of sleepy Christians today.  Though some Christians may be sleepy, they are still Christians.  Paul says, “wake up from your slumber”.  Why?  Because our salvation is closer now than when we first came to Jesus.  We got saved when we came to Jesus, yet we are in the process of being saved as well.  Still, when Jesus returns, we will be fully saved.  Thus the three aspects to salvation, we got saved, we are being saved, and we will be saved. 

Paul is saying that the Day of our Lord, His return is near.  If this is the case, then let’s not follow after our sinful nature, but let’s put on Jesus and walk in the light for that Light will soon return for us, and we need to be ready for Him.  Since again, we see that our sinful nature is not yet eradicated.  It is still with us, yet we have the ability through the Holy Spirit to have dominion over it.