The 'Author' in authority...

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. (Romans 8:28 ESV)

Today I set off to check mail along the walking path that encircles the compound and I saw a huge deer (no exaggeration-- he-- I think he was a he-- was nearly as tall as I am) in woods in the same area where Colby the Cat likes to hang out (on the trunk of a big fallen tree)...

Well, we're halfway through the 4th week and just one more day until a 3-day weekend! Woo-hoo!

Monday in class after the midterm exam (which I passed, thankfully-- an 84 because of stupidity: messed up accents, verb endings, and I couldn't remember the word "inherit"...but I count my blessings, because some guys didn't make it...) our professor delivered an abbreviated chapel service right there in the classroom, since the seminary was closed for the Fourth. His devotional was from the beginning of Romans 13. Paul is writing about submitting to secular authority:

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer. Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God's wrath but also for the sake of conscience. For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed. (Romans 13:1-7 ESV)

It was pretty good (very often in class the pastor in our Greek professor bubbles over and a few gems emerge). It got me to thinking of a) two of my heroes who gave their lives for refusal to submit (a very difficult decision to make as a Christian in certain situations, especially at the customs checkpoint on the border of Church and State) for the right reasons, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Martin Luther King, Jr.; and b) Thomas Jefferson's words: 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 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...

And speaking of the name Jefferson, Monday night after dinner an episode of The Jeffersons from 1980 that I had never seen was on Antenna TV. It was about George's first dry cleaning store that he was trying to open in Harlem in April 1968. Dr. King's assassination was the fulcrum of the plot. It was a powerful episode that made my eyes water near the end. George's son wanted to, understandably, join the Holy Week Uprising and fight back... If you haven't seen it, you should (it's free here on YouTube). See if you can keep dry eyes when Louise yanks King's picture off the wall at the end.

As I was watching the episode, I kept thinking about our Monday devotional and Romans 13.

During Tuesday chapel, we had a reading from Luther's Large Catechism on the Third Petition of the Lord's Prayer ("Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven."). This got me to thinking of all that's wrong in the world and all that we have to pray for-- often our perspective is wrong. As Luther says, "The good and gracious will of God is done indeed without our prayer; but we pray in this petition that it may be done among us also." Sometimes I have to re-calibrate myself-- and actually pay more attention to the Lord's Prayer. The world looks much different through faith, by putting God first.

Today in class we heard this gem of truth: "You guys better learn this stuff while you can because the job of a pastor is to read the Word of God. That's what they'll be paying you for."

Now back to it... Another quiz tomorrow... Better learn this stuff while I can!  :)

P.S. I have heard that there are Lutherans who profess that the Colonists sinned by declaring themselves independent of the British Crown and fighting back...I'd sure like to meet one for a teaching moment about the The Magdeburg Confession of 1550, which came about 6 years after Luther's death and which set set forth the Doctrine of the Lesser Magistrates. This doctrine teaches that when a superior authority makes unjust laws or decrees, the lesser authority has a God-given right and duty to resist those unjust laws or decrees. Whenever possible, citizens were to obey the state. The church was not to meddle in civil affairs, nor the state meddle in theological matters-- Luther's Doctrine of the Two Kingdoms.