Justice in Government

GOLDEN TEXT: “The God of Israel said, the Rock of Israel spoke to me, He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God. And he shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds; as the tender grass springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain.” —II Samuel 23:3,4

DEUTERONOMY 16:18-20; AMOS 5:12-15

THE words of our Golden Text were spoken by David, and they refer to the instructions which the Lord gave to him concerning his rulership over the nation of Israel. The government over which David was anointed to be head, or king, was typical of the kingdom of Christ, and therefore it was spoken of as the “throne of the Lord.”—I Chron. 29:23

It was important that the principles which were to prevail in this typical kingdom of the Lord should reflect the justice of God’s own rulership, of which we read, “Justice and judgment are the habitation of thy throne: mercy and truth shall go before thy face.”—Ps. 89:14

David himself, with some exceptions, ruled Israel justly. But this was not true of all his successors, although there were a number of noble kings of the davidic line. However, the pattern established by the Lord was one of justice and righteousness, and these ideal principles of government will actually prevail in the kingdom of Christ of which the throne of David was a type. Concerning this we read, “Of the increase of his [Christ’s] government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.”—Isa: 9:7

Centuries before Israel became a kingdom, through Moses the Lord gave instructions concerning the importance of justice in overseeing the affairs of the people. Moses ‘said, “Judges and officers shalt thou make in all thy gates, … and they shall judge the people with just judgment. Thou shalt not wrest judgment; thou shalt not respect persons, neither take a gift: for a gift doth blind the eyes of the wise, and pervert the words of the righteous.”—Deut. 16:18,19

Hundreds of years later the Lord said to the people of the ten-tribe kingdom of Israel, “I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins: they afflict the just, they take a bribe, and turn aside the poor in the gate from their right.”—Amos 5:12

Thus it was that in matters of government as well as along other lines, in his dealings with Israel God demonstrated that fallen man, left to his own devices, would not adhere to his laws of justice and righteousness. It would have been the same with any other nation. The only way that divine righteousness can be established in the earth is through the kingdom of the Messiah, the antitypical David.

ROMANS 13:1-7

THE typical kingdom of Israel ceased to function in 606 B.C., when Zedekiah was overthrown and the nation was taken captive to Babylon by King Nebuchadnezzar. It was then that the Prophet Daniel, one of the Hebrew captives in Babylon, said to Nebuchadnezzar, “Thou, O king, art a king of kings: for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory. And wheresoever the children of men dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath he given into thine hand, and hath made thee ruler over them all.”—Dan. 2:37,38

This grant of civil authority was given by God to Nebuchadnezzar as king of Babylon. Verses 39-43 reveal that this arrangement was to be passed on to three other “kingdoms” or empires. History reveals these to be Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. Rome was ruling when, as in our lesson, Paul wrote, “The powers that be are ordained of God.” Later this was true of the divisions of the Roman Empire.

It does not mean that God sanctioned and blessed all that these governments did. The thought is, rather, that God permitted them to rule during the interim between the overthrow of his typical kingdom and the full establishment of the antitypical, or messianic kingdom. Their chief function from God’s standpoint has been to maintain sufficient law and order to permit the spread of the Gospel, that through its drawing and transforming power a “people for his name” might be taken out of the world and prepared to live and reign with Christ.—Acts 15:14-17

Exhorting that prayers be offered for “kings, and for all that are in authority.” Paul gives as the reason. “That ye may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.”—I Tim. 2:1,2

QUESTIONS

To whom was our Golden Text addressed?

What place did Israel’s kingdom have in the plan of God?

What did Paul mean when he wrote, “The powers that be are ordained of God”?

| Home Page | Table of Contents |