Get Out the Vote

To Christians, Romans 13 is usually the beginning of our learning about our relationship with government and the State. There, Paul draws fairly clear lines between the Sovereign and the Subject. He was addressing an audience, even if they were Roman citizens as he was, who had no question about their place in that equation. They and he were subjects, not sovereigns. Only the Emperor, to a lesser extent the Senate and those few enfranchised to engage the Senate could claim any sovereignty. The subjects, especially the fugitive band of Disciples in the Way did not have a voice in their own government.

Even so, Paul admonishes subjects to be good subjects and to glorify God in all things, even honoring the sovereigns and magistrates who ruled and persecuted them. To those in the State, the centurions, the jailers, the governors, Paul did not tell them to quit but to do their work justly and always to God’s glory. Paul availed himself of the Empire’s judicial process when he appealed from Governor Felix to the Emperor, seeking the larger audience in the biggest city and center of power to proclaim Christ and to speak a little truth to power. He lost his head for it.

In the United States of America, those lines blur a bit. In very real, useful ways, we are subjects and sovereigns. Those who would govern, even for a brief moment in history, must seek and maintain our approval for their work, and the governors bend their work toward our prevailing and diverse will. Now, we have universal suffrage and ample opportunity to choose our governors, to shape the State and always to speak to its power. The sovereign is not a king but is a people. We enjoy both roles, and we bear the double burden of being good subjects and just rulers, citizens and State. We should abide government but always remember that the government exists only at our consent.

If you live in a Super Tuesday state, vote today. Vote for God’s glory.