The Nature of Government Authority
Freedom of the Individual Will
Freedom of the Individual Will
We have governments among men by God's design.
Rom.13:1-7 Let every soul be subject
unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be
are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the
power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to
themselves damnation. For rulers are not a terror to
good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that
which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: For he is the
minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid;
for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger
to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be
subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake. For for this
cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God's ministers, attending continually
upon this very thing. Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom
tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom
honour.
Titus 3:1 Put them in mind to be subject to principalities
and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work,1 Pt.2: 12-5 Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles: that, whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation. Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; Or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of them that do well. For so is the will of God, that with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men:
Ultimately “We ought to obey God rather
than men.” (Ac.5:29) “So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God.” (Rom.14:12) “thy soul shall be required of thee” (Lk.12:20) Our first
and foremost obligation is to obey God above all other authorities.
The center of
authority is the will which
is in the heart of man. 1 Corinthians 7:37 “Nevertheless he that standeth stedfast in his heart, having no necessity,
but hath power over his own will, and hath so decreed in his heart”. A person has authority over their own
will and heart. Ex. 35:29 The children of Israel brought a willing offering
unto the LORD, every man and woman, whose heart made them willing to
bring for all manner of work, which the LORD had commanded to be made by the
hand of Moses. 2 Corinthians
9:7 Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him
give; not grudgingly, or of necessity:
for God loveth a cheerful giver. 1 Chron. 28:9 …serve him with a perfect heart
and with a willing mind: for the Lord searcheth all hearts, and
understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts: Ezra 7:13…which are minded
of their own freewill to go up to Jerusalem...
This authority also pertains unto their property. Mt.
20:25 Is it not lawful for me to
do what I will with mine own? Act.5:4 Whiles it remained, was
it not thine own? and after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? King
Ahab said unto Jezebel- “I spake unto Naboth the Jezreelite, and said unto him,
Give me thy vineyard for money; or else, if it please thee, I will give thee
another vineyard for it: and he answered, I will not give thee my vineyard.”
(1 Ki.21:6) “Neither shalt thou steal… Neither shalt thou desire thy
neighbour's wife, neither shalt thou covet thy neighbour's house, his field, or
his manservant, or his maidservant, his ox, or his ass, or any thing that is
thy neighbour's.” (Dt.5:19, 21)
This
revolutionary truth of the freedom/authority/rights of the individual became a
key debate during the American Revolution and the Enlightenment era as a
product of the 1st Great Awakening and Reformation manifested it in early
stages; as the light of Christianity guided this country's founding. It was the will of the individual man breaking free from the iron yoke
of the Church/State leviathan. (https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel03.html
) Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. (2 Cor.3:17) Ever since Lucifer
magnified his will beyond its delegation from God the usurping of will (pride/selfwill) has become the mover of sedition and bondage through the ages.
Isa.14:12-14 How art thou fallen from
heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground,
which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine heart, I will
ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit
also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will
ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.
And of course the will must be subject in humility to the laws of God. "Without liberty, law loses its nature and its name, and becomes oppression. Without law, liberty also loses its nature and its name, and becomes licentiousness."- James Wilson (Shain, Myth of American Individualism, pp. 155–319; Hall and Hall, Collected Works of James Wilson, p. 435.) Echoing the scriptures regarding God's grace being turned into lasciviousness; as well as standing fast in God's liberty allowing none to bring you into bondage. (Jd.4, Rom.6:1, Gal.5:1,13)
The power to rule and the right of rule is recognized by and resides with the people. Interestingly while God ordains the powers, some forms of government are better than others. (1 Sam.8:5-7, 19-22)
Rom.2:14-15 For when the Gentiles, which
have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having
not the law, are a law unto themselves: Which shew the work of the law
written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their
thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another;)
'Tis substantially true, that virtue or morality is a
necessary spring of popular government. The rule indeed extends with more or
less force to every species of Free Government. Who that is a sincere friend to
it, can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the
fabric.” –Farewell Address
The US founding fathers sound like theologians in the quickened spirit
of that era as they try to extricate the authority of the church with that of
the state and the individual:
“Well aware that the opinions and
belief of men depend not on their own will, but follow involuntarily the
evidence proposed to their minds; that Almighty God hath created the mind free,
and manifested his supreme will that free it shall remain by making it
altogether insusceptible of restraint; that all attempts to influence it by
temporal punishments, or burthens, or by civil incapacitations, tend only to
beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness, and are a departure from the plan of
the holy author of our religion, who being lord both of body and mind, yet chose
not to propagate it by coercions on either, as was in his Almighty power to do,
but to extend it by its influence on reason alone; that the impious presumption
of legislators and rulers, civil as well as ecclesiastical, who, being
themselves but fallible and uninspired men, have assumed dominion over the
faith of others, setting up their own opinions and modes of thinking as the
only true and infallible, and as such endeavoring to impose them on others,
hath established and maintained false religions over the greatest part of the
world and through all time: That to compel a man to furnish contributions of
money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is
sinful and tyrannical; that even the forcing him to support this or that teacher
of his own religious persuasion, is depriving him of the comfortable liberty of
giving his contributions to the particular pastor whose morals he would make
his pattern…” Thomas
Jefferson Draft for a Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom 1779
“When, in the course of human events, it becomes
necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected
them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate
and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them,
a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare
the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all
men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain
unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men,
deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any
form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the
people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its
foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to
them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence,
indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed
for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that
mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right
themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a
long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object
evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it
is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for
their future security.” The Unanimous
Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen United States of America
“A declaration of
rights made by the representatives of the good people of Virginia, assembled in
full and free convention; which rights do pertain to them and their posterity,
as the basis and foundation of government.
SECTION I.
That all men are by nature equally free and independent and have certain inherent
rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any
compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and
liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and
obtaining happiness and safety.
SEC. 2.
That all power is vested in, and consequently derived from, the people; that
magistrates are their trustees and servants and at all times amenable to them.
SEC. 3.
That government is, or ought to be, instituted for the common benefit,
protection, and security of the people, nation, or community; of all the
various modes and forms of government, that is best which is capable of
producing the greatest degree of happiness and safety and is most effectually
secured against the danger of maladministration; and that, when any government
shall be found inadequate or contrary to these purposes, a majority of the
community hath an indubitable, inalienable, and indefeasible right to reform,
alter, or abolish it, in such manner as shall be judged most conducive to the
public weal.
SEC. 16.
That religion, or the duty which we owe to our Creator, and the manner of
discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or
violence; and therefore all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of
religion, according to the dictates of conscience; and that it is the mutual
duty of all to practice Christian forbearance, love, and charity toward each
other.”
THE VIRGINIA DECLARATION OF RIGHTS- George Mason
“If it was possible for men, who exercise their reason to
believe, that the divine Author of our existence intended a part of the human
race to hold an absolute property in, and an unbounded power over others,
marked out by his infinite goodness and wisdom, as the objects of a legal
domination never rightfully resistible, however severe and oppressive, the
inhabitants of these colonies might at least require from the parliament of
Great-Britain some evidence, that this dreadful authority over them, has been granted
to that body. But a reverence for our great Creator, principles of humanity,
and the dictates of common sense, must convince all those who reflect upon the
subject, that government was instituted to promote the welfare of mankind, and
ought to be administered for the attainment of that end… We gratefully
acknowledge, as signal instances of the Divine favour towards us, that his
Providence would not permit us to be called into this severe controversy, until
we were grown up to our present strength, had been previously exercised in
warlike operation, and possessed of the means of defending ourselves. With
hearts fortified with these animating reflections, we most solemnly, before God
and the world, *declare*, that exerting the utmost energy of those powers,
which our beneficent Creator hath graciously bestowed upon us, the arms we have
been compelled by our enemies to assume, we will, in defiance of every hazard,
with unabating firmness and perseverence, employ for the preservation of our
liberties; being with one mind resolved to die freemen rather than to live
slaves.” Second Continental Congress
Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking up Arms July 6 1775
“We the subscribers, citizens of the said Commonwealth,
having taken into serious consideration, a Bill printed by order of the last
Session of General Assembly, entitled "A Bill establishing a provision for
Teachers of the Christian Religion," and conceiving that the same if
finally armed with the sanctions of a law, will be a dangerous abuse of power,
are bound as faithful members of a free State to remonstrate against it, and to
declare the reasons by which we are determined. We remonstrate against the said
Bill,
Because we hold it for a fundamental and
undeniable truth, "that religion or the duty which we owe to our Creator
and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and
conviction, not by force or violence." The Religion then of every man must
be left to the conviction and conscience of every man; and it is the right of
every man to exercise it as these may dictate. This right is in its nature an unalienable
right. It is unalienable, because the opinions of men, depending only on the
evidence contemplated by their own minds cannot follow the dictates of other
men: It is unalienable also, because what is here a right towards men, is a
duty towards the Creator. It is the duty of every man to render to the Creator
such homage and such only as he believes to be acceptable to him…
Because Religion be exempt from the authority of the
Society at large, still less can it be subject to that of the Legislative Body.
The latter are but the creatures and vicegerents of the former. Their
jurisdiction is both derivative and limited: it is limited with regard to the
co-ordinate departments, more necessarily is it limited with regard to the
constituents. The preservation of a free Government requires not merely, that
the metes and bounds which separate each department of power be invariably
maintained; but more especially that neither of them be suffered to overleap
the great Barrier which defends the rights of the people. The Rulers who are
guilty of such an encroachment, exceed the commission from which they derive
their authority, and are Tyrants. The People who submit to it are governed by
laws made neither by themselves nor by an authority derived from them, and are
slaves…
…Who does not see that the same authority which can
establish Christianity, in exclusion of all other Religions, may establish with
the same ease any particular sect of Christians, in exclusion of all other
Sects? that the same authority which can force a citizen to contribute three
pence only of his property for the support of any one establishment, may force
him to conform to any other establishment in all cases whatsoever?
…If "all men are by nature equally free and
independent," all men are to be considered as entering into Society on
equal conditions; as relinquishing no more, and therefore retaining no less,
one than another, of their natural rights. Above all are they to be considered
as retaining an "equal title to the free exercise of Religion according to
the dictates of Conscience." Whilst we assert for ourselves a freedom to
embrace, to profess and to observe the Religion which we believe to be of
divine origin, we cannot deny an equal freedom to those whose minds have not
yet yielded to the evidence which has convinced us. If this freedom be abused,
it is an offence against God, not against man: To God, therefore, not to man,
must an account of it be rendered.
Because the Bill implies either that the
Civil Magistrate is a competent Judge of Religious Truth; or that he may employ
Religion as an engine of Civil policy. The first is an arrogant pretension
falsified by the contradictory opinions of Rulers in all ages, and throughout
the world: the second an unhallowed perversion of the means of salvation.
Because the establishment proposed by the Bill is not
requisite for the support of the Christian Religion. To say that it is, is a
contradiction to the Christian Religion itself, for every page of it disavows a
dependence on the powers of this world: it is a contradiction to fact; for it
is known that this Religion both existed and flourished, not only without the
support of human laws, but in spite of every opposition from them, and not only
during the period of miraculous aid, but long after it had been left to its own
evidence and the ordinary care of Providence. Nay, it is a contradiction in
terms; for a Religion not invented by human policy, must have pre-existed and
been supported, before it was established by human policy. It is moreover to
weaken in those who profess this Religion a pious confidence in its innate
excellence and the patronage of its Author; and to foster in those who still
reject it, a suspicion that its friends are too conscious of its fallacies to
trust it to its own merits.
… If Religion be not within the cognizance of Civil
Government how can its legal establishment be necessary to Civil Government?
What influence in fact have ecclesiastical establishments had on Civil Society?
In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins
of the Civil authority; in many instances they have been seen upholding the
thrones of political tyranny: in no instance have they been seen the guardians
of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wished to subvert the public
liberty, may have found an established Clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just Government
instituted to secure & perpetuate it needs them not. Such a Government will
be best supported by protecting every Citizen in the enjoyment of his Religion
with the same equal hand which protects his person and his property; by neither
invading the equal rights of any Sect, nor suffering any Sect to invade those
of another.
Because finally, "the equal right of every citizen
to the free exercise of his Religion according to the dictates of
conscience" is held by the same tenure with all our other rights. If we
recur to its origin, it is equally the gift of nature; if we weigh its
importance, it cannot be less dear to us; if we consult the "Declaration
of those rights which pertain to the good people of Virginia, as the basis and
foundation of Government," it is enumerated with equal solemnity, or
rather studied emphasis. Either the, we must say, that the Will of the
Legislature is the only measure of their authority; and that in the plenitude
of this authority, they may sweep away all our fundamental rights; or, that
they are bound to leave this particular right untouched and sacred: Either we
must say, that they may controul the freedom of the press, may abolish the
Trial by Jury, may swallow up the Executive and Judiciary Powers of the State;
nay that they may despoil us of our very right of suffrage, and erect themselves
into an independent and hereditary Assembly or, we must say, that they have no
authority to enact into the law the Bill under consideration.” James Madison- Memorial and
Remonstrance 1785
