that radical President!

Romans 13
1Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.

Following the Romans passage means legislating for a change in immigration laws that you think are unjust. It does not mean arbitrarily choosing to follow some laws and not others according to your wishes. As I have mentioned in prior blogs, civil disobedience also means accepting the punishment of breaking the law, not demanding rights that are not present. You don’t have biblical permission to be too quick to civil disobedience in the first place. Remember this…

Jesus, Peter, and Paul who are the primary recorded teachers in the New Testament didn’t advocate breaking the laws of Rome, though Rome was an extremely oppressive and tyrannical government. A practical rule of thumb for civil disobedience is if a government law causes me to sin egregiously, like turning Jews over to be killed, forcing me to have an abortion, or jailing someone because they are not my religion, then I may in good conscience disobey, with the understanding that I must be willing to suffer the consequences.

All too often Christians immediately default to the “Love your neighbor as yourself” card and mistakenly think this means anything goes. This couldn’t be further from the truth. The disciple who “wills the good for himself and does it”, a biblical definition for “love of self,” is denying what he wants way more than giving in to his desires. To “love my neighbor” is to want what God wants for them. This often means doing the thing I don’t want to do and not doing the thing I want to do.


This passage leaves room for the Christian who is a citizen to be politically involved and work to change legislation that reflects their values, whatever they may be. For example, according to our legal system, President Bush does not have any say in immigration other than deportation issues during time of war. Immigration is a congressional issue.

Yet the President can express his support for legislation that reflects his thinking. In this case, he finds himself supporting the widest guest worker policies and his position would be similar to the most vocal advocates for more immigrants. This is why it is so naive and disingenuous when you saw signs in the protest speaking against the President. First, immigration is not in his jurisdiction. Naiveté. Second, he pretty much advocates the same position as the protesters. Disingenuousness.