ENGAGE/TENSION
This morning I’m going to preach on a section of Scripture that I don’t particularly like. And my guess is that if most of you are completely honest, you don’t like it either. That’s because it flies in the face of our natural tendencies.
Submission is not a natural response for most people. It is certainly not something that is valued in our world where hanging on to one’s rights seems to be of the highest importance and where it has become quite acceptable and even fashionable to rebel against all forms of authority. Unfortunately, as disciples of Jesus, we’re not immune to being influenced by our culture’s view of submission. So there is a natural tendency to resist the entire idea, sometimes quite openly and sometimes in much more subtle ways.
As we continue our study of the book of 1 Peter, we’re going to come to a section of Peter’s letter where the idea of submission is going to be the central theme. This week, we’re going to deal with how we are to submit to those in authority in our government and in our jobs and then next week, we’ll see how Peter deals with submission in the marriage relationship.
So go ahead and turn in your Bibles to 1 Peter chapter 2. Even though I included verses 11 and 12 in the passage we studied last week, I’m going to begin in verse 11 this morning because those verses serve as a needed introduction to the rest of this morning’s passage.
TRUTH
Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.
Be subject for the Lord's sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme, or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good. For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God. Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor.
Servants, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust. For this is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God. For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.
(1 Peter 2:11-25 ESV)
I’ll begin by summarizing Peter’s main idea here and then we’ll proceed to look at some important aspects of that idea. Here is how we can summarize the main theme of this passage:
Jesus saved me through His submission
so that I can serve Him through my submission
This morning, I don’t really have a neat little three point outline of this passage complete with alliteration or rhyming. Instead, I’m just going to share some of the important truths about Biblical submission that we can draw from the passage. As I do that I’m primarily going to focus on submission to governmental authorities.
SOME IMPORTANT TRUTHS ABOUT BIBLICAL SUBMISSION
1. Being a citizen of heaven does not relieve me of my responsibility to submit to earthly authority
In verse 11, Peter reminded his readers, and he reminds us, that we are sojourners and exiles in this world. And that truth may very well lead us to think that since we’re citizens of heaven rather than citizens of this world that we therefore have no responsibility to submit to the authority of this world. But Peter puts that idea to rest immediately when he commands his readers to be subject to every human institution.
That idea really shouldn’t come as a surrpise to us. If any of us want to drive down to Rocky Point for a vacation, the moment we cross the international border into Mexico, we must obey the laws of Mexico even though we are still citizens of the United States. And if we don’t, there are some serious consequences.
The same thing is true for us spiritually. Although we are citizens of heaven, as long as we remain here on earth, we must submit to the man-made laws of our government. As we’ll see this morning, there is one narrow exception to that general rule, but frankly that exception probably occurs much less frequently than we might think.
2. Jesus is to be our example of what it means to submit Biblically
The structure of this passage is quite instructive for us. The entire section from 1 Peter chapter 2, verse 13 through chapter 3, verse 7 deals directly with the idea of submission. And right in the middle of that section, Peter writes that the suffering of Jesus is to be our example to demonstrate both why submission is required in our lives and how we are to go about doing that.
When Jesus came into this world, even though He was the one who created the world and every form of authority that existed here on earth, He willingly submitted Himself to human authority. As a child, He submitted to the authority of His parents. And as an adult He submitted to the authority of the governmental authorities even though He certainly had the ability and power to completely overthrow those governments had He desired to do so.
And even when He suffered unjustly at the hands of those earthly authorities, He did not rebel, but instead entrusted Himself to His Father. And as a result of his submission, we have the ability to be reconciled to God and live a life of righteousness.
That is certainly not the way the world naturally submits to authority, but as disciples of Jesus, we are called to follow His example. So as we discuss what it means to submit this morning, we need to keep the example of Jesus before us.
3. While I benefit personally from my submission, the main purpose of submission is to give glory to God
Peter doesn’t really address it here, but elsewhere in Scripture we find that God places people under earthly authority for our own good.
But as Peter makes clear in his letter, our submission is not primarily about us at all – it is about giving glory to God. We see that explicitly in verse 12 where Peter tells his readers that the reason for keeping their conduct honorable here on earth is so that others would see that behavior and glorify God. And then as he goes on to describe how submission to earthly authority is a crucial aspect of that kind of conduct, he keeps bringing everything back to God:
• In verse 13, the reason we are to submit is “for the Lord’s sake”.
• In verse 15, we see that this kind of submission is “the will of God”. For those of you who are searching for God’s will in your life, this would be a good place to start since this is one of the few places in Scripture where we are told explicitly what God’s will is.
• In verse 16, we find that when we submit, we are “living as servants of God”.
• In verse 19, we are told to be “mindful of God”.
• In verse 20, we see that suffering as a result of our submission is “a gracious thing in the sight of God”.
I especially want to call your attention to verse 15, where Peter writes that when we submit to governmental authorities, we “put to silence the ignorance of foolish people”. The word translated “ignorance” there doesn’t just mean a lack of knowledge. It describes the willful, hostile rejection of the truth.
And what Peter points here is that we are never going to silence that hostility and win people to Jesus by winning some political argument or advancing some cause, but rather we do that by submitting to governmental authority.
Even though many of His followers certainly wanted Him to be, Jesus was never openly hostile to the government authorities of His day in spite of the fact that they certainly treated He and His fellow Jews with great distain. Jesus went out of His way not to engage in political controversies because he understood that doing so would have sidetracked Him from His task of seeking and saving the lost. We would do well to follow His example.
4. Biblical submission is a matter of the heart
Most of us have probably heard of the little boy whose mother kept insisting that he sit down in his high chair. He finally unlocked his knees and plopped down into the chair and exclaimed “I may be sitting on the outside, but I’m still standing on the inside.”
That is not the kind of submission that Peter is describing here. Peter describes the kind of heart attitude that we are to have in verse 16. There is a great paradox here. Although we have been freed from slavery to all human institutions through Jesus, He calls us to submit willingly and freely to those same institutions for His sake.
And then in verse 17, we find four commands that all deal with our heart attitude:
• Honor everyone – even if they aren’t honorable
• Love the brotherhood – even if they aren’t loveable
• Fear God
• Honor the emperor. This is the most amazing of the four commands considering that the emperor at the time was none other than the evil Nero who would eventually put both Paul and Peter to death.
Here’s a pretty good test to determine how well you’re doing in this area. Do you submit to the authorities because you’re afraid you’ll get caught if you don’t or do you submit in order to honor Jesus? Let me get even more practical here and now I’m preaching to myself as well as many of you. Do you obey the speed limit when you drive for Jesus’ sake or because you’re afraid of getting a ticket? Ouch! This passage certainly makes me believe that no Christian should own a radar detector since their sole purpose of such a device is merely to keep someone from getting caught while they are breaking the law.
Just this week I was driving home in the construction zone on Oracle Road, where, even though the majority of the construction is done, the speed limit is still 35 miles per hour. I will admit that I was going with the majority of the traffic flow at around 45 miles per hour, so I hesitate to even mention the guy in the SUV that went flying by me at about 60 miles per hour with the fish emblem and the “Honor God” bumper sticker on the back of his vehicle. I was reminded why I have chosen not to identify myself as a Christian while I’m driving with those kinds of signs.
5. “Every” really does mean every
I’ve seen people go through all kinds of mental gymnastics to try and prove that when Peter writes “every human institution” in verse 13, he really doesn’t mean every.
I’ve seen people claim that in the United States that the people are the government and therefore we’re somehow exempt from the command to submit to our government authorities. I’ve seen others claim that Peter only meant good and just governments, which makes no sense whatsoever considering that the Roman government in place at the time was evil and hostile to Christians.
But the language here is pretty clear. Peter intentionally used the word “every” here and the word he used is not ambiguous nor does it have other possible meanings. And Peter doesn’t provide us with any exceptions here, which he certainly could have had he wanted to.
Peter further confirms that every means every when he writes that servants are to submit to their masters even if they are unjust and when he cites the example of Jesus. And not surprisingly, Paul confirms this same idea:
Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment.
(Romans 13:1-2 ESV)
The language is once again unequivocal – “there is no authority except from God”. We don’t have time to belabor the point, but throughout Scripture we have examples of ungodly and evil governments and rulers that God used to accomplish His purposes. So just because we can’t understand why God put someone in a position of authority doesn’t mean that we are not to submit.
There is only one Scriptural reason for us to ever refuse to submit to our governing authorities, and as I mentioned earlier, it is a very narrow exception and one with which we are rarely faced. That exception is based on the truth that…
6. God is our ultimate authority
This idea is expressed by Peter with his command to “fear God” in verse 17. While our government officials deserve appropriate honor, they are not on the same level as God. So while we are to honor other men, we are only to fear God.
This concept is also implied in verse 13 when Peter uses the phrase “human institution”. The word “institution” there literally means “creation” and everywhere else it is used in the Bible it refers to God’s creation. So while no authority exists except that which comes from God, our governments, regardless of their form, are merely human creations and that means they are not absolutely sovereign like God is.
The implication here is that there may be some infrequent occasions where the command to fear God must take precedence over the command to honor our governmental officials. I’m going to be very careful here with my wording so I want you to pay close attention when I describe the circumstances under which we must do this. When our government requires us to do something that would violate the clear commands in the Bible, we must choose to fear and obey God rather than honor men.
Let me be really clear here. While we may be rightly troubled over laws that permit, but which do not command, others to do wrong, that does not give us the right to selectively disobey other laws. We have a lot of examples of those kinds of laws in our country.
For instance, the law permits women to kill their unborn children, but it does not force or compel any Christian to do that. That does not give any Christian the right to kill abortion doctors or bomb abortion clinics.
The Supreme Court has ruled that homosexual couples must be permitted to marry, but it does not force Christians to enter into a homosexual marriage. So we can’t use our disapproval of that decision to justify violating another law, like refusing to pay our taxes.
Peter certainly understood this principle as a result of his personal experience. When the apostles were brought before the Sanhedrin and commanded not to preach about Jesus, Peter and John answered like this:
But Peter and John answered them, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.”
(Acts 4:19-20 ESV)
When they continued to preach Jesus the apostles were arrested, but an angel of the Lord freed them from prison and they entered the temple and began to preach about Jesus again. When they were brought back before the council again and reprimanded for not obeying their earlier command, Peter and the other apostles responded with these words:
But Peter and the apostles answered, “We must obey God rather than men.
(Acts 5:29 ESV)
So Peter was clearly familiar with the one possible exception to the command to submit to the governing authorities and yet he chose not to mention it at all here in his letter. That is likely because he didn’t want an infrequent exception draw away from the main principle.
The other thing we need to keep in mind here is that our hope is in God alone and not in any politician. I am not suggesting in any way that we don’t participate in the political process or that we don’t work to elect godly people to office. In fact, I think we have an obligation to vote for those who are most likely in our eyes to uphold Biblical principles.
I’m thankful that in the presidential race we have at least a few people whose words and lives have consistently given evidence of their faith in Jesus. And I’m praying that one of those people will become our next president.
But I also know that my hope is not in any politician, no matter how godly that person might be. I’ll admit it’s taken me a while to learn this lesson. There have been a number of elections in my lifetime where I nearly went into depression as I watched the results come in. And without a doubt many of the people we have elected in recent years have been openly opposed to God and His principles. But as this passage reminds us, I don’t need to fear those men because ultimately God is sovereign and His purposes will prevail. So I choose to put my hope in Him rather than in any man.
7. My submission will often lead to suffering
In this passage Peter makes it clear that our submission sometimes means that we will suffer unjustly. But when we do that and endure, it is a gracious thing in the sight of God. Certainly Jesus experienced suffering as a result of His submission. But instead of rebelling or fighting back, he chose to endure that suffering and trust that His Father would eventually make things right. We would do well to follow His example.
So far we’ve seen that…
Jesus saved me through His submission
so that I can serve Him through my submission
APPLICATION
Up to this point, while I’ve used a couple of concrete examples, much of what we’ve talked about is pretty theoretical. So what practical steps can we take to put the things we’ve learned into practice in our lives? Obviously there are a lot of possible ways to apply this principle in our lives, but let me leave you with just three that seem to me to be the most critical.
1. Teach and model submission to our children
The idea of submission to authority begins in the Bible with the command to honor our fathers and mothers. And certainly the idea of honoring our parents includes submitting to their authority. That means that learning to submit in the way we have discussed today begins in the home. So as parents and grandparents and as the church we have a responsibility to teach our children the importance of submission to authority, and even more important to model that for them.
When I see the way that many adults, including those who claim to be Christians, constantly disrespect and fail to submit to those in positions of authority I’m not surprised that we have a whole generation of children who rebel against authority at every level.
• If your children watch you undermine the authority of their teachers, you shouldn’t be surprised when they fail to submit to those teachers.
• If you don’t respect and honor your own parents, don’t be surprised when your children rebel against your authority.
• If you’re constantly complaining about our government officials in a disrespectful manner, then don’t be surprised when your children have that same attitude toward the police or other authorities.
2. Pray for those in authority
I’m not going to belabor this point too much, because my guess is this is one of things we all know we are supposed to do but we just aren’t very consistent in doing it. I will confess that is certainly true in my life. All I really need to do here is to just share what Paul wrote in his first letter to Timothy:
First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
(1 Timothy 2:1-4 ESV)
I wonder how much more peaceful and quiet our lives would be if we spent as much time praying for our leaders as we did complaining about them. And I also wonder how much more effective our witness for Jesus would be as well.
3. Treat those in authority with respect, even when you disagree
We live in a time and place where many of our leaders hold some very immoral beliefs. So as I mentioned earlier, I am not suggesting at all that we ought to be absent from the political process. We do need to speak up for Biblical principles and stand against those who would openly advocate positions that violate the Scriptures. But when we do that we need to do it with respect. Paul gives us some good guidelines in his letter to Titus:
Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people.
(Titus 3:1-2 ESV)
We’re going to explore this idea some more during the “Connections” time and look at some Biblical examples of those who chose to fear God rather than honor men, but who did it in a respectful way.
Let me suggest some ways we can apply this principle:
• We should address our government officials by respectfully using their titles rather than resort to calling them names. We should respect the office and the person even if we disagree with them on issues.
• We should not attempt to disparage our government officials by sharing false or misleading information about them. In this digital age, that means that I shouldn’t post Photo-shopped pictures or memes that attribute words to someone that they didn’t actually speak. It means taking time to verify if what I’m posting is factually true before I share it with others.
• When we do disagree on an issue, we should unapologetically keep the focus on what the Bible says without personal attacks on those who might hold opposing views.
Jesus saved me through His submission
so that I can serve Him through my submission
INSPIRATION
As I mentioned at the beginning of the message, this isn’t a passage that I particularly like because it reveals an area in my life where I have a lot of work to do. And my guess is that this whole idea of submission is not one that’s particularly comfortable or easy to apply for many of you as well.
But we need to remember that we don’t submit primarily for our sake, although we do benefit from our submission to the authority that God has established in our lives. We submit for the Lord’s sake. We submit because we are following the example of Jesus who submitted so that we could be saved, knowing that our submission to human authority brings glory to God and leads to the expansion of His kingdom.
ACTION
I don’t believe that we’re studying this passage this morning by accident. I believe that in the midst of this political season, God is challenging all of us to take a step back and to submit our own natural tendencies to the clear teaching of His Word. That won’t be easy, but for the Lord’s sake it is certainly necessary.
