A lot of things are happening this year of 2020 that mean significant changes for the world. It’s important to remember who and what you can really trust as we move into the time when “deceit will wax worse and worse” in the world.
“Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help.” – Psalm 146:3 — (The son of man there means people in general)…
What does the Bible say about civil government? I offer several quick thoughts about this. And about cities. It seems cities are always problems for God and man.
The first city in the Bible, and the history of the world, was built by Cain.
“And Cain knew his wife; and she conceived, and bare Enoch: and he builded a city, and called the name of the city, after the name of his son, Enoch.” – Genesis 4:7
Here’s a warning for the end times, when people dwell in cities that have no defensive walls:
And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates,-Ezekiel 38:11
In 1 Samuel 8, you find the record of the “elders of Israel” who came to Samuel and asked him to make them “a king to judge us like all the nations”. With this, they thought they had a solution to the corruption of Samuel’s sons. They were asking for worse corruption, and Samuel warned them.
Actually God warned them through Samuel that the people were rejecting him, God, not Samuel, so that “I should not reign over them”.
Samuel warned them, and keep in mind, not much has changed since then:
1 Samuel 8:11-18
11And he said, This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: He will take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and some shall run before his chariots.
12And he will appoint him captains over thousands, and captains over fifties; and will set them to ear his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots.
13And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers.
14And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants.
15And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants.
16And he will take your menservants, and your maidservants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work.
17He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants.
18And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the LORD will not hear you in that day.
By the way, this passage in I Samuel 8 lays waste to all the “divine right of kings” idea.
But where are thy gods that thou hast made thee? let them arise, if they can save thee in the time of thy trouble: for according to the number of thy cities are thy gods, O Judah. – Jeremiah 2:28
For according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have ye set up altars to that shameful thing, even altars to burn incense unto Baal. – Jeremiah 11:13
Now about rendering unto Caesar the things that be Caesar’s:
And he said unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesar’s, and unto God the things which be God’s. – Luke 20:25
About that. What did Caesar legitimately own? Did he owe everything to the use of force against all the peoples subject to his reign? What do you call it when somebody takes something from you at the point of a sword? That’s right, you call that theft!
Matthew 17:24-27: 24
And when they were come to Capernaum, they that received tribute money came to Peter, and said, Doth not your master pay tribute?
25 He saith, Yes. And when he was come into the house, Jesus prevented him, saying, What thinkest thou, Simon? of whom do the kings of the earth take custom or tribute? of their own children, or of strangers?
26 Peter saith unto him, Of strangers. Jesus saith unto him, Then are the children free.
27 Notwithstanding, lest we should offend them, go thou to the sea, and cast an hook, and take up the fish that first cometh up; and when thou hast opened his mouth, thou shalt find a piece of money: that take, and give unto them for me and thee.
And now, the prophecy that the kings of the earth would “take counsel together” against God “and against his anointed”, but that the Lord would get the last laugh:
Psalm 2: 1 Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?
2 The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying,
3 Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.
4 He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the LORD shall have them in derision.
5 Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure.
Jesus warned us against trusting anybody who seeks a position of power. Jesus told his disciples to seek to be servants to others. This is why so many Christian ministries from his day to this day have emphasized helping others, helping the poor, rescuing the babies discarded by the Greeks, Romans, and Chinese, St. Patrick bringing salvation, literacy, and the end of the slave trade in Ireland, clinics that grew from the care of the poor, and so much more.
Matthew 20:25-28
25 But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them.
26 But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister;
27 And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant:
28 Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.
In the end:
And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.–Daniel 2:44
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