Romans 13:1-7

3. The Christian's Duty to Rulers.

This exhortation has seemed to many out of place, since in Romans 13:8 the precepts resume their general character, and the connection with what precedes is not obvious. Some have found this connection in the persecuting character of the state; others discover an apologetical design; others again find reasons for the exhortation in the special circumstances of the church, while Godet thinks that the Apostle ‘after having shown the Christian consecrating his body to the service of God, places him successively in the two domains in which he should realize the sacrifice of himself: that of spiritual life properly so termed, and that of civil life.' He includes Romans 13:8-10 in this section. But admitting this, we may yet find an occasion for the exhortation, and one, moreover, which serves to connect it with the closing thought of the last chapter. The Jews in Rome had been banished from the city for a time by the Emperor Claudius (A.D. 51) on account of their turbulent spirit. This turbulence was doubtless the result of the political character of their Messianic expectations. Nowhere would such a result be more pronounced than at Rome, and the Christians there, though not Jewish, could scarcely fail to be more or less affected in the same way. It is no reproach to them to assume that they had not yet understood what many, even now, do not recognize, namely, that the freedom of the gospel is primarily spiritual, out of which, by degrees, in the appointed way, a reformation and transformation of civil relations should proceed. Moreover, the character of the imperial rulers was such (Nero was then emperor) that the exhortation was only a specific application to the precept: ‘overcome evil with good' (chap. Romans 12:21). By obedience to this exhortation, under such rulers, the Church of Christ won her moral victory over the Roman empire and heathendom. When she exalted herself to rule, instead of humbling herself to obedience, her weakness began.

The course of thought is simple: The duty of obedience to rulers and its motive in the divine appointment (Romans 13:1-2); another motive, from the salutary design of government (Romans 13:3-4); the two thoughts combined (Romans 13:5), and the principle illustrated from the universal paying of taxes (Romans 13:6), then applied in a detailed exhortation (Romans 13:7).