Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Does the Bible Say Anything About Policing? Part II

Starting point is 00:00:05 Welcome to Tim Minna Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life and the time it takes to get to work. My name is Patrick Miller. And I'm Keith Simon. So if you're with us last week, we discussed what the New Testament says about policing, and we're going to pick up where we left off. We are using a chapter out of Esau-Macali's book, Reading While Black. Excellent chapter. We commend the whole book to you. But we're using it as a basis to have a conversation about what we think about policing.

Starting point is 00:00:33 and we promised you that we'd dive into Romans 13. What does it say about policing and protest? And we're going to get there in one moment. But first, Patrick, do you have any police officers in your family, friend group? What's the closest police officer you have relationally to you? I've had police officers in small groups, Bible studies, that kind of thing in the past. Now, I wouldn't say that any of them are deep, close, personal friends. I've had some of my friends who are officers invite me to go out with them at night.

Starting point is 00:01:05 Have you ever done it? No, I really want to. I'm such not a night person that I think I'd be asleep like in the car. And I wouldn't be catching this? Probably not. But I really, really want to do it. And talking about this last week and this week, it makes me want to do it all the more. And I especially want to get you out there.

Starting point is 00:01:24 Maybe we both go together. Can we both go together? Live podcast episode. Two bulletproof vests. That sounds good to me. All right. We'll see if we can make it happen. So last week we talked about, like he said, a New Testament theology of policing.

Starting point is 00:01:37 And we looked specifically at the words of John the Baptist because he's talking to individual police officers and how they do their jobs and how they did their jobs back in ancient Rome. Today we're going to pull the camera back a little bit and talk about the bigger picture. How do we think about how we as a nation, we as a community of people who have to live together talk about think about policing? and I think the place to go is going to be Romans 13. Now, that might surprise people, because if you know Romans 13, you might know that it's the place where Paul says that God has given all governments their authority, and he calls his fellow Christians to submit to that authority. This has been a passage which has been used by many governments throughout many centuries in different ways. How have you heard this passage get used in the past? Well, it's almost always used as to say, shut up and sit down and do what the government tells you to do. because God has ordained the government, and therefore they have the power to kind of tell you to pay taxes or tell you go to war, not go to war, whatever it is, and therefore it is used to silence people probably. That's how I've experienced it in the past.

Starting point is 00:02:45 Yeah, I've also seen it used to justify action, where it's maybe said, hey, we're the authority that God has put in place, and that means that whatever we do is under God's authority. God's given me the ability to do this thing. This was used back in the days with kings. This was the idea that a monarch had a right from God to be the ruler. And they would point to Romans 13 and say, see, I'm your king and you should obey me. And do what I say. You know what the American said about that?

Starting point is 00:03:11 Well, we had our own revolution, right? Yeah. We didn't think Romans 13 meant that, okay? But now you'll see Americans. We'll use it to say, hey, don't you question what our governments do it? We don't mind disobeying things when it's for our advantage. So just suffice it to say. this has been a passage with a complex history of reception throughout the church.

Starting point is 00:03:28 So I'm going to read through it, even though it's a little bit long. I think you have to hear it to understand what's being said. So Romans 13, verse 1, 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. Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. for rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free

Starting point is 00:03:58 from fear of the one in authority? Then do what's right, and you'll be commended. For the one in authority is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid. For rulers do not bear the sword for no reason. They are God's servants, agents of wrath, to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. Therefore, it's necessary to submit to the authorities not only because of possible punishment, but also as a matter of conscience. Now, every passage, every verse in the Bible comes in a context. And one of the problems we forget is to consider context when we're trying to figure out what a passage means.

Starting point is 00:04:34 Well, Romans 13 is no difference. It comes in a context of Paul's letter to the Romans and even a broader context of the New Testament and the whole Bible. So a real quick example. You might be familiar with a popular verse, I can do all things through Jesus who strengthens. me. What can you do through Jesus who strengthens you, Keith? Well, the place I see that all the time is like a soccer poster, right? I can score a goal because Jesus is going to make that ball go in. Now,

Starting point is 00:05:02 he never worked that way for me, by the way. I still can't score a goal. It makes me think of touchdown Jesus, right? You know, you get the guys, you get down to the end zone. And I'm sure, I promise at some point in the history of the NFL, someone has verbally said, I can do all things through Christ Jesus. Didn't Tim Tebow, when he played in the league, have it in his eye paint below his eyes. Philippians 413, or it was on his shoes or something like that. Well, here's the deal. If you go back and read the context of Philippians and Philippians 4... Was Paul playing football? You find out quickly, this has nothing to do with sports. What you can do through Christ who strengthens you is be content in all circumstances. And where was Paul when he wrote this?

Starting point is 00:05:42 He was in a Roman jail. So Paul is saying, I can survive my imprisonment. I can do that kind of thing through Christ Jesus. And he remained in prison even after writing that. It was just funny. We want to use it to say, hey, I can do anything. And Paul is saying, hey, I can make it to my suffering. I can be content in my suffering. So how will context shape our view of Romans 13? Well, as the number suggests, there are 12 chapters which come before this and actually three chapters which come after it. So there's a lot to be said about context in Romans 13. But let me start here. Paul was very aware of the fact that there were in fact governments, which were in fact established by God, which were in fact in rebellion to God. They were a terror to people. Well, even Rome was, right? I mean, when Paul's writing this,

Starting point is 00:06:28 Nero's probably the emperor of Rome, and he was obviously a pagan who was very opposed to the God of the Bible. Well, and Paul worshipped a savior who was falsely accused and executed under those false accusations. Paul's very aware of the fact that governments don't always do the right things. In fact, In Romans 9, Paul talks about one of those governments. He goes all the way back to the ancient days of Israel when they were slaves in Egypt, and he talks about the Pharaoh. But when Paul is talking about these governments that are opposed God, he's still saying that they are servants of God appointed by God, right? Yeah. Paul's got a big both end happening here. We seem to think that if someone's a servant of God, they must be doing everything that God wants them to do. Now, that would be the ideal servant.

Starting point is 00:07:14 but the Bible is very, very aware of the fact, and Paul was a man rooted deeply in the Old Testament. The Old Testament could not be more clear. There are people who are servants of God, who don't realize that they're servants of God, and have no intention of serving God. And as his servants, they will execute, they will do things that he wants them to do, but they will also do things that he doesn't want to do, and he will hold them accountable. So this sounds really confusing until, let me just give an example. We flipped to a passage in Isaiah 10.

Starting point is 00:07:41 So back in the days of Isaiah, Israel was rebrand. rebelling against God. They were doing things that God didn't want them to do. And God's response was to bring justice against them. And the justice that he brought against them was the Assyrian nation, conquering them. But check out what Isaiah says. This is Isaiah 10 versus 5. He says, woe to the Assyrian, the rod of my anger in whose hand is the club of my wrath. Remember what Paul calls Rome? He calls them Asians of God's wrath. Do you know what he's riffing on? That's a phrase that comes out of the Old Testament to describe these nations, they are agents of God's wrath. They are the means by which God executes his justice. But let's keep going. Verse six, I send him, that's Assyria,

Starting point is 00:08:24 against a godless nation. That's Israel. I dispatch him against the people who anger me to seize loot and snatch plunder and to trample them down like mud in the streets. So Assyria is the agent of God's wrath, and it's bringing about God's justice. But does this mean that whatever Assyria does is okay in God's check out verse 7. But this is not what he intends. This is not what he had in mind. His purpose is to destroy, to put an end to many nations. Verse 16, therefore the Lord, Yahweh Almighty, will send a wasting disease upon their sturdy warriors under the king's pomp. A fire will be kindled like a blazing flame. Now, this is a long explanation to make a point. When Paul calls this nation of Rome, the servant of God, he's not saying that everything Rome does is okay. He's being very

Starting point is 00:09:11 clear. Rome will be held accountable eventually by other nations which will overthrow Rome. So just because you have the authority of God, it does not mean that your actions are just. And so you can rebuke, you can protest, you can speak against, vote against, work against a government that is appointed by God but doing unjust things. Is that right? Yeah, absolutely. So the call to submission does not mean being completely and utterly submissive. I, affirm and for everything that my government does. So let's go back to the context of Romans. Patrick had briefly mentioned that Pharaoh and Egypt were mentioned in Chapter 9. Now, what do we know about Egypt? Well, we know that it was ruled by Pharaoh who was very much opposed to God.

Starting point is 00:10:00 The whole Egyptian system was set up to be opposed to God. They worshipped false gods, right? And yet, I think in light of Romans 13, we would say, that they had been appointed or given their authority that the Egyptian government had by God. Now, how did God's people respond? Well, you remember the story, right? God raised up Moses, and Moses was God's ambassador to speak hard truths to the Egyptian Pharaoh. God delivered his people out of Egypt through a deliverer, a human deliverer in Moses. So I think what we have to recognize is that there is a place for human protest against God-appointed government. And in fact, Moses gives us the other example of what maybe we're not supposed to do.

Starting point is 00:10:53 Because when Moses is a younger man and he sees these Egyptian taskmasters oppressing his fellow Hebrew slaves, what does he do? He murders a guy. And it seems like Moses is trying to start the revolution. He's trying to get people to do the uprising against Egypt. come on, let's go. Now, his fellow Hebrew slaves, they don't have any interest in doing that. In fact, they threaten to turn them in. But here's what I think this takes us to. It shows us what's at the heart of this call to submission. When we're called to submit, it's being called to submit by realizing that I don't have absolute discernment. I don't know how God is going to deal with the injustices

Starting point is 00:11:29 in my world. And I can't take those things into my own hands. I don't have the right to say, you know what, I'm going to take up arms, I'm going to solve this problem by violence. God says, that's my prerogative, I'll do it in my time, you don't worry about it, you submit. And by the way, this was a very real temptation for the people that Paul was writing to, because at the time that he's writing this, there are freedom wars that are beginning to happen all the way in Jerusalem. And he's writing to Jews who would have been tempted to set sail, go back to Jerusalem, take up arms against Rome, and free the motherland. And I think Paul's being really careful here to say, no, this is not God.

Starting point is 00:12:04 God's timing. God doesn't want you to be a part of that. Jesus made that clear, and we can't go and do it. You need to submit. So if you were with us last week, you probably remember that we made the point that Roman soldiers functioned as police force inside of Rome. And so one of the things that we need to ask is, what does Romans 13 say about police and to police about how to do their job and us as Christians about what we should expect from the police. And one of the things we have to acknowledge is that Paul's description of the state in Romans 13 is idealized. And one of the things he says is he says the state holds no terror for those who do right.

Starting point is 00:12:46 Well, again, I just don't know how to state the obvious. Paul knew that Rome actually did hold terror for those who were doing right. He knew that Jesus was crucified. Eventually, he himself would be executed. Christians were being executed, not for doing anything wrong, but because they were doing the right thing. So when Paul says that the state doesn't hold terror for those who do right, he's giving us an idealized vision. This is what the state ought to be. This is what they should aspire unto.

Starting point is 00:13:11 And what we see in Romans 13 is that one of the important charges that is given to the state, this idealized state, like Patrick said, is to keep order. Order is a good thing. Order is something that is valued in the Bible. But that doesn't give the state the freedom to abuse their power in order to obtain order. order. So Paul calls the state agents of wrath in Romans 13-4, but what he's not doing is saying, okay, because you are police, because you have the backing of the state, because you have been given the right to keep order, in fact, the charge to keep order, that everything you do is okay, that everything you do in the name of order is justified. He's not saying that. Yeah, and it's clear that God prefers states that keep order. Paul can

Starting point is 00:14:01 only do his missionary journey because there was an orderly state with roads and traffic ways and systems of being able to pass around letters. His missionary journey cannot happen. He can't do what he did in a disordered state. When we look around today and we see people who are trying to almost become anarchist and create their own little mini states where there is complete and absolute disorder, that is not God's vision of how a government should function. When we look at what happened, dare I say it, and the whole Chas thing, that stuff's insanity. Graffiti. Graffiti, walls, urinating everywhere, taking over public buildings, taking over private residences. That's not order. That is disorder. And that's not the kind of government that God wants.

Starting point is 00:14:41 But on the flip side, God wasn't okay with the government that, like he said, gets its order by terrorizing people. And that's the other thing that this passage says. It says that rulers should hold no terror for those who do right. When the state starts frightening and scaring people who aren't doing anything wrong, they aren't doing anything illegal, they aren't doing anything that's bringing disorder to society. That's a huge problem. Yeah, let's just think about that because I'm embarrassed to say that I've read that verse so many times and never pulled out what it was saying until I read this chapter in reading while

Starting point is 00:15:15 black. But let's just say it again, this is Romans 133. For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. And I think what I always did is read that to say, if you do right things, if you do good things. If you don't break the law, you'll never have to be afraid. You'll never be filled with fear at the thought of police or the government. So that's a naive way to think because I've only had very positive interactions with the police. Even when I've done something wrong, I've never had an encounter with the police that I thought they were in the wrong. I deserved whatever I got.

Starting point is 00:15:54 And I was treated respectfully. But I think what this verse is saying is, that if people aren't doing anything wrong, if they're out there protesting peacefully, or if they're just living their life, driving their car, going to work, doing the normal things that a person does, walking down the street, they shouldn't be filled with fear because of the police. And if they are, then that is on the wrong side of God's teaching here, the wrong side of Romans 13. One other thought about Romans 13. If John the Baptist in our last episode we talked about this. He was talking to individual police officers. That's who he was focused on. He was giving them individual advice, we might say. And there's some people who are great with that. Yeah, talk to

Starting point is 00:16:39 individuals, help them change how they think individually. What they don't like is when people start talking about changing systems. I want to reform a system. They say, well, the Bible wants to change individuals. It doesn't have anything to do with the system. Well, Romans 13 gives us a pretty big problem because Paul isn't addressing individuals. He's addressing the attitude of the state towards its populace. He's addressing. systems, how those systems function. And so, again, I think this gives us good grounds, good reasons, to be able to say that calls for systemic changes, calls for broad reform, those are appropriate. And in fact, the broad systems that order are policing, those really do matter to God.

Starting point is 00:17:17 He cares about them. Okay, when I started this episode by asking Patrick if he knew many police officers, if he was close friends with him, if he talked to him. And then I said that I had been invited out to go on patrol with officers and had declined. I was saying all that to make a point. And that point is this, I get, I think Patrick gets to, I think probably you even get that a police officer's job is incredibly difficult, that you're making life and death decisions in split seconds, that you come with your own baggage, your own biases, your own problems, your own sinfulness, you know, just like we all do. And so it's possible for us to say we have a lot of respect for what police officers do, and we know the vast majority of police officers are out

Starting point is 00:18:03 there doing their best, do the right thing. And at the same time, we can all agree, including the good police officers, but all of us can agree that there are incidences of police brutality, there are incidences of racial profiling, there are incidences of bad behavior. And we can't just ignore those. Those aren't justified by the state. Those aren't justified because that person has a badge, right? And so we as Christians can live in this nuanced world where we can say, yes, God is given the state authority, but it's okay to protest. I mean, even we as Christians are going to do that, right? If the government were to take away religious liberty, do you think we'd obey that? Of course we would not. We would say like Peter did in Acts 5, we must obey God, not man.

Starting point is 00:18:52 So let's be careful not to create this quote unquote biblical teaching that says that no one can ever protest the state. The state's actions are always justified because we don't even believe that ourselves in our own life. So if you're a police officer out there trying to follow Christ, you have our utmost respect. If you're a person out there who's been terrorized for doing right, you have our utmost sympathy. Let's work together to bring about a more just world in every part of it, including our policing. Thanks for listening.

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Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Does the Bible Say Anything About Policing? Part II

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