Bible Commentaries
Romans 13

Verses 1-7

Now we come to the fourth relationship in Ro­mans. Relationship to civil authorities (Romans 13:1-7)

Romans 13:1. Let every person be in subjection to the governing au­thorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God.

Romans 13:2.Therefore he who resists authority has opposed the or­dinance of God; and they who have opposed will receive condemnation upon themselves.

When Paul wrote this passage, Nero was on the throne of Rome as Caesar. He was a terrible man who became emperor only because his mother Agrippina got rid of every man who was in Nero’s way. There was no question she was a really wicked woman.

But, you know, after he came to the throne, Nero turned around and condemned his mother to death.

When the executioners came to kill her, she said, “Strike. Level your raids against the womb which gave birth to such a monster.”

Here you have extremely wicked, corrupt, vi­cious people in authority. And yet Paul writes to the Christians who were living under that author­ity to “be in subjection to the governing authori­ties. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God.”

We are to be subject to civil authority. Why? Because rulers are ordained of God. They receive authority from Him. How they rule is not the ques­tion before us nor is their character. Paul doesn’t bring up the question of Nero with all his wicked­ness and his temper and his murder and his cor­ruption. He brings up one fact—that the powers, the civil leaders, are ordained of God; and, there­fore, they receive their authority from Him.

Allow me to give you an illustration. From Isaiah 44:28 to chapter 45:6, you have where God raised up a man by the name of Cyrus to be head of the Media-Persian empire. He calls him “My shep­herd.”

Now Cyrus was an idolator. He was corrupt. Yet God called him His shepherd. Why? Because God gave him the authority so that the Jewish remnant could go back to Israel. You remember, Zerubbabel and Ezra went back and built the temple; and, afterward, Nehemiah came and built the walls of the city.

Now I’m not going to go into that except for one thing. It’s not that Cyrus was a saved man, but he was a minister of God in the sense that he was given the authority to liberate the remnant of Is­rael from Babylon. In that sense he was a servant of God. His authority came from God. God estab­lished human government.

Go back to Genesis 9:1-29. After the flood, God gave man the authority, the power, to govern the world. I repeat it. How men govern is not in question.

When you and I have manifest contempt for the government, that’s lawlessness. We are resisting the authority that was given to men.

We’re living in a day when people thumb their noses at the government because they don’t like what’s going on. But I have to recognize my place is one of subjection to the government. The power, the authority, is ordained of God.

Romans 13:3. For rulers are not a cause of fear for good behavior, but for evil. Do you want to have no fear of authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same;

Romans 13:4. For it is a minister of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath upon the one who practices evil.

It’s a terrible thing today that we have public sympathy for criminals. In fact, we have more sympathy for the criminal awaiting judgment than we have for the ones he killed or injured. Men ex­cuse the criminal “because he’s got a disease.” So sin is no longer sin. Corruption is no longer cor­ruption. Murder is no longer murder. Stealing is no longer stealing. It’s just a disease.

My friend, God has authorized government to keep down evildoers; and, when you sympathize with those who are guilty of crime, you rebel against God. This is a sad picture today when sin is no longer sin.

And if Satan can get us to minimize sin, then he can minimize the work of Christ on the cross. When sin is no longer sin, no longer lawlessness, when it’s just a disease, I tell you we have come to the place where nothing short of the wrath of God is going to fall on our generation. Anything that is against the righteous character of God is sin and will come under the judgment of God.

Romans 13:5. Wherefore it is necessary to be in subjection, not only because of wrath, but also for conscience’ sake.

If I might change the wording, “You must be subject to the government not only because of what it can do to you when you break laws, but also for your own conscience’s sake.” We are to be subject to constituted authority. Whatever the law says, there is no question as to our duty.

“But, Mr. Mitchell, what about my conscience? What if the government demands something that is contrary to my conscience?”

Well, may I say this? Governments are for the earth, for the keeping down of evildoers. Remem­ber this. This is a basic thing. But governments don’t control the realm of the spiritual.

For example, you take the Book of Daniel. Azariah, Mishael and Hananiah refused to bow the knee to Nebuchadnezzar’s golden image. Theirs was a question of conscience before God. The is­sue here is not government. The issue is God. They refused to bow the knee to an image the king had made. He was trying to control and direct their worship. That’s a different proposition.

So here, for example, if I am told I may no longer preach the gospel of Christ, if I am told I may no longer worship the Lord Jesus Christ or stand for the Word of God, I would rather go to jail. It is a question now not of government, but a question of relationship. And if it is contrary to my conscience before God and the issue is concerning my rela­tionship to God, there is no question where I will stand. I will stand for God whatever the cost may be to me.

But I want to get to your heart that, as a Christian, I’m under the government. As long as the government doesn’t interfere with my walk be­fore God and my obedience to His Word, I will obey the government because it is ordained of God. I may not agree with some of the methods of gov­ernment; but, as I said, I am not dealing with gov­ernment alone. I am dealing with the authority the government has that comes from God. And, be­cause it’s from God, I must be in subjection to my government.

Now we get down to the pocketbook.

Romans 13:6. For because of this you also pay taxes, for rulers are servants of God, devoting themselves to this very thing.

Romans 13:7. Render to all what is due them: tax to whom tax is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor.

In other words, pay your taxes.

“But, Mr. Mitchell, I don’t like my tax bill,” you say.

Brother, neither do I. But I pay my taxes. I’m a Christian. I’m subject to the authority that’s over me. I pay my taxes for conscience sake. I pay my taxes to support the government. The leaders are ministers of God to keep down evildoers, and they must be supported.

We have a responsibility here as Christians. In Matthew 17:1-27 in the matter of the tribute money, the Lord Jesus, the Creator of all things, the Lord from heaven, didn’t dodge His taxes.

Remember that. He recognized the Romans had their place of authority even though the Jews squirmed a great deal because of the way Rome treated them. Nevertheless the Son of God said to Peter, “You go and catch a fish. In its mouth you’ll find some money. Pay the taxes for me and pay your taxes, too, from that same money.” Why? “Lest we give them offense” (Matthew 17:27). Lest we should cause any trouble.

Again, I repeat it.

If the time ever comes in our country where we have to choose between our relationship to God and our relationship to our government, if the is­sue comes up that it is either Christ or Caesar, then only one decision can be made and that is for the Saviour.

Whatever it costs, whether it means a firing line or jail, we must stand by the Saviour.

Verses 8-14

Romans 13:8. Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.

Now we are not talking about this word “love,” which is used so commonly today with no depth to it. In fact, what people sometimes call love today is nothing but lust.

Paul writes this in view of the return of the Lord, who manifested His love for His Father by obedi­ence. He manifested His love for you and me by sacrifice, by dying for us. Likewise, we also as Christians manifest our love for our Heavenly Fa­ther by obedience, by being obedient to His Word. We manifest our love for each other by sacrifice, by “dying,” as it were, for the saints and for our neighbors. Love is a perpetual debt, and we are to owe no man anything but love.

“But, Mr. Mitchell,” you ask, “why did Paul bring the law in here?”

He is dealing with our relationship to man. In our relationship with God, it is a question of faith, of putting our trust in Him. God sees our faith; man experiences our love—not our faith, but our love.

Paul uses the law to show us our relationship to each other in practical living.

Romans 13:9. For this, “YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, YOU SHALL NOT MURDER, YOU SHALL NOT STEAL, YOU SHALL NOT COVET,” and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, “YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.”

Romans 13:10. Love does no wrong to a neighbor; love therefore is the fulfillment of the law.

In the Ten Commandments, the first four laws govern our responsibility to God. Paul doesn’t use them here. He is talking about our re­lationship to each other. The law is righteous, and the law demands righteousness. Now love alone can keep the law. Love is the active principle of Christianity. When we love God and man, we fulfill the purpose of the law. The one who loves has wrought righteousness.

You see, friend, if I’m going to use the law as a means of life, then I’ll never have life. The law was never given as a means of life to the unsaved, and the law was never given as a rule of life to the saved. The law has had nothing to say since the cross. But as Christians, indwelt by the Spirit of God, we will keep that part of the law that relates to society. That’s why I say here, no man is ever saved by keeping the law. We are saved by grace through faith in the Saviour. The Saviour is the object of our faith as we had in the first eight chapters of Romans.

But concerning my relationship to society, my neighbors and other people on earth, I have a responsibility; and love is the only way I can ex­press that. When you love people, my friend, you will do things you never dreamed of doing. Love alone can keep the law.

But I want to make this very, very clear—don’t expect the government to manifest love. God doesn’t expect the government to manifest love. God doesn’t expect the government to rule by love.

The government is to rule by righteousness. “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a dis­grace to any people” (Proverbs 14:34).

Righteousness is the act-of-principle for reign­ing, but love is the act-of-principle for living with one another.

Why should I love my neighbor as myself?

Romans 13:11. And this do, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed.

The incentive for us to love our neighbor is because each day brings our salvation nearer. And, if Paul could say that to the early Church, believe me, my friend, how much closer the com­ing of the Lord is to us now. This is the incentive— the Lord Jesus may come today.

Do you remember Philippians 4:5 where it speaks of the fact that the Lord is near? The marginal note reads that “the Lord is at hand.” What manner of men are we to be? Oh, listen, I can’t guarantee that the Lord will not come today.

Now you might say to me, “Well, Mr. Mitchell, the Church down through the centuries believed that and He hasn’t come.”

That’s true. Why that’s even the genius of it. He may come today. And I’m to live today just as Paul lived his day in expectation of seeing Him whom having not seen we love. And here he says, be­cause our “salvation is nearer to us than when we believed,” then we ought to love our neighbor as ourselves. We ought to manifest that love which would be for the benefit of our neighbor for the glorifying of God.

Oh, when I think about it, my generation and your generation are so full of indifference and coldness to this appeal of the Saviour that I won­der what will break them down. We are not fight­ing so much outbroken opposition to the gospel. We don’t meet so much vileness against the gospel today. We just meet cold indifference. And it’s not only bad to be indifferent, it’s terrible to be satis­fied with your indifference.

And, may I say very kindly, this is also true of many Christians. I’m not questioning their salva­tion, but one begins to wonder how much love they have for the Saviour.

Our nearly empty Sunday night and Wednes­day night prayer meeting services give an indica­tion of this. And now many churches have dropped these services entirely!

Oh, to be delivered from this cold, cold indiffer­ence to the warmth of the love of our Saviour. It is possible that you and I can be right in our doctrine and be cold in our heart and indifferent to the ap­peal of our Saviour that we should live before men as “the children of God . . . in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world” (Philippians 2:15). We ought to buy up every opportunity to love our neighbors and live a life that will glorify God in the world.

Oh, listen, my friend, why don’t you read the times? It’s high time to awake out of sleep. Am I talking to you? Are you a sleepy Christian? An in­different Christian? A luke-warm Christian? Are you so satisfied with the things of this world that in some way, somehow, you have missed Christ’s appeal that you manifest the character, the heart, the compassion and tenderness of the Saviour to men and women for whom He died?

How am I going to reach my generation? How are you going to reach your generation if we don’t manifest that precious divine love of the Saviour?

And please don’t tell me, “Mr. Mitchell, I just can’t stand my neighbors.”

Listen, the Lord loved you when you were His enemy.

And that same divine love that caused Him to leave the glory and die for you when you were His enemy is the same love that is indwelling your heart by the Spirit of God.

“The love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us,” Paul wrote in Romans 5:5.

As you and I walk before God in the light of His Word and in the Spirit of God, then we begin to manifest the character and the heart and the love and the compassion and the tenderness of our Saviour.

If you knew, my Christian friend, that the Lord Jesus was coming for you tonight, wouldn’t you change your plans for today?

I remember someone once said to Mr. Wesley, “Sir, what would you do if you knew the Lord was coming today?”

He said, “I would be doing just what I am doing. I am living today, every day in the anticipation of the coming of our Saviour.”

Or as G. Campbell Morgan used to say, “I am liv­ing and serving as if the Lord was coming today, and I am working my head off as if the Lord was going to tarry a hundred years.”

Romans 13:12. The night is almost gone, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light.

Romans 13:13 Let us behave properly as in the day. . . .parThe hour for the coming of the Lord Jesus is at hand, that of which He spoke in John 14:3, “And if I go . . . I will come again, and receive you to Myself.” Now, in view of this, my hope being stimulated, my watchfulness being aroused, what shall I do?

Notice, three times in verses 12-13, Paul says, “Let us”—“Let us cast off . . . Let us put on . . . Let us walk.”

Now let me ask you. What are the works of darkness? The next verse tells us:

Romans 13:14. Not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy.

As someone has said, “Let’s get rid of our night clothes, the clothes of darkness.” Cast off the works of darkness. Throw off your night clothes, the deeds of the old man—rioting and drunken­ness. That means intemperance. That means pub­lic passions.

Rioting and drunkenness are the outbroken sins of society. I needn’t go into them. Rioting and drunkenness don’t belong to the children of God. Rioting and drunkenness are the manifestation of the sins of the night. This is the world outside of Christ.

The second couple—chambering and wanton­ness, sexual promiscuity and sensuality—are the secret sins of society—impurity and corruption.

You and I are living in a day of situation ethics.

“If two people agree that they want to do certain things, what’s wrong with that? They both love each other. Let them do what they want to do,” the world says.

It’s moral corruption, and with that moral cor­ruption comes the fruitage of that corruption— disease. I question even if medical science could give us an accurate account of how many people suffer from sexual diseases in our country. One reads that a tremendous percentage of young peo­ple are already diseased. This is chambering and wantonness. Let it not once be named among us as the children of God.

I know you may say, “Oh, Mr. Mitchell, you won’t find me drunk. No, sir!”

But what about those secret sins, the sins that brought God’s wrath on the world at the flood, the sins that brought down the wrath of God on Baby­lon, Sodom, Gomorrah and Greece. I am sorry to say the cup of iniquity is filling full in our country and throughout the world.

Oh, listen, Christian friend. I am appealing to you today. You and I haven’t very much more time left on earth to magnify the Saviour.

Please listen to me. We can’t afford to live one day out of fellowship with God.

I tell you that we are surrounded with this wave of situation ethics, of moral corruption, this free­dom of expression that is lapping over, not only in our schools but into our churches and into our society.

As Christians, as children of God, let us walk honestly before God, not in rioting and drunken­ness, not in chambering and wantonness.

You say, “Why, Mr. Mitchell, I am not guilty of rioting. I am not guilty of drunkenness. I am not guilty of immorality.”

All right, but look at the next two. What about the last couple? These are sins of our heart, sins of our emotions. Notice the company that “strife and jealousy—envy ” keep.

I want to tell you how sad my heart was the day I heard of a split in a church in a certain city, a church with a wonderful testimony for God out of which there sprang three or four new congrega­tions. The breakup had arisen out of fighting and strife among the members. It was a case of envy, of jealousy.

Oh, listen. Someone has said that envy and jeal­ousy are the sins of Christian workers. God forbid!

How easy it is to become jealous and envious of someone, even of some other Christian, some other Christian whom God is using. And because your own heart is out of fellowship with God, you say things you shouldn’t say about him or her. There is envy and jealousy; and the first thing you know, you divide God’s people. Shame on us Christians!

No, sir, we wouldn’t be found guilty of rioting and drunkenness, nor would we be guilty of chambering and wantonness, impurities and moral corruption. But what about these inner things, these passions—strife and envying and jealousy? Song of Solomon 8:6 says, “Jealousy is as severe as Sheol; its flashes are flashes of fire.”

O, God, deliver us from such a thing.

And one finds it in the most unexpected quar­ters.

May I say to you who are preachers, Christian workers, Sunday School teachers, officers in the church, whoever you may be, God deliver you and me from envy and jealousy of some other Christian whom God is using. I may not agree with all he does, but God is using him. To his own Master he stands or falls. May we keep our hands off and glorify what God is doing.

Did you ever notice in your Bible, that often, when the Spirit of God through His servants gives us a list of the sins of society, He will bring in envy and strife and jealousy? These sins are common among God’s people, and they do nothing but separate the saints.

Rather wouldn’t it be a wonderful thing for God’s people to be knitted together around the Person of Christ so we would see each other in Christ Jesus, not in our weakness, in our frailty or even in our failures?

The time is at hand. The day is far spent. The Lord is even at the door. He may come today. What an incentive to live for God. What an incentive to throw off rioting and drunkenness. What an incen­tive to throw off the sins of the flesh, immorality and uncleanness. What an incentive to throw off all strife and bickering and fighting and jealousy.

And then what are we to do? Let us turn to 1 Thessalonians 5:8 for an answer: “But since we are of the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet, the hope of salvation.” In Romans, Paul says:

Romans 13:14. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provi­sion for the flesh in regard to its lusts.

This is the place of victory. This is the place of deliverance.

“Put on.”

In other words, recognize your identification with the Risen Lord and appropriate Him for your daily needs. We look forward to His return, but now we experience Him in a delivered life. It means to live Christ.

For example, you take Philippians 1:20-21, that “Christ shall even now, as always, be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me, to live is Christ.”

We are to live like citizens of another world. Paul’s determination was (Philippians 3:10; Philippians 3:8) “that I may know Him, and the power of His resur­rection, and the fellowship of His sufferings. . . . I count all things but loss . . . that I may gain Christ”—that I might know Christ.

Make no provision for the flesh, for its desires and for its lusts. All you need is found in Christ.

Take everything. Take your weaknesses, take your circumstances, take your frailties, take the whole business to Him. He is all you need.

And what are His terms?

“Put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”

That means to be in Him. That means to put Him on like a garment, to arm ourselves with His power for our lives day by day.

That’s for you.

That’s for me.

Oh, listen, my Christian friend, why don’t you appropriate Christ today?

You say, “I want to live a victorious life, Mr. Mitchell.”

Well, listen. You let Him live His life out through you, and then you enjoy the deliverance. This will manifest love toward society. Oh, how we need this. I need this just as much as you need it. And God grant today that you and I may walk before Him and live in the light of His presence, radiating something of the sweetness and the aroma of Christ. Oh, that people may see Christ living in you and me. Let us manifest a loving spirit toward others by our speech, what we do, where we go— so Christ shall be glorified.