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Editorial: A time for disobedience
by JAMES A. SMITH SR.
Executive Editor
Florida Baptist Witness

Article Date: Nov 25, 2009

Is there anything which the government would compel you to do for which you believe it’s permissible to disobey? Even more, is there anything the state would require you to practice for which you would be obligated to resist?

May you disobey the government? Indeed, must you defy civil authorities?

For the Christian, especially, civil disobedience is not a matter of trivia. Christians understand the existence of government is not the result of man’s imagination. Like the family and the church, God created the institution of government. In their proper function, each institution enjoys a sphere of influence granted by God.

As a divinely ordered reality, Christians are obligated to submit to governing authorities, including those which are undemocratic and pagan (see the Apostle Paul’s instructions to the church in Rome in the first century, Romans 13:1-7). The Bible’s instructions are unambiguously clear: government is to be obeyed, except in extraordinary circumstances.

For some Christians leaders, extraordinary circumstances may soon be upon believers in our nation. Indeed, there are ominous signs that an increasingly unbridled state is threatening to impose its will over the God-ordained spheres of the family and church, causing us to need to draw the proverbial line in the sand.

Here, we must stand. We can do no other.

The “Manhattan Declaration: A Call of Christian Conscience” seeks to draw the line in the sand, putting the government on notice that there are certain matters on which the signers will not compromise, no matter the cost.

“Because we honor justice and the common good, we will not comply with any edict that purports to compel our institutions to participate in abortions, embryo-destructive research, assisted suicide and euthanasia, or any other anti-life act; nor will we bend to any rule purporting to force us to bless immoral sexual partnerships, treat them as marriages or the equivalent, or refrain from proclaiming the truth, as we know it, about morality and immorality and marriage and the family.”

Recalling the words of Jesus Himself when questioned about the tension between service to God and obedience to the state (Matt. 22:15-22), the statement concludes, “We will fully and ungrudgingly render to Caesar what is Caesar’s. But under no circumstances will we render to Caesar what is God’s.”

Drafted by Charles Colson, Robert George and Timothy George, the 4,700-word statement was released Nov. 20 at a press conference in Washington, D.C., with more than 150 original signatories, including many Southern Baptist leaders – several former SBC presidents, entity heads and leading pastors. Among the signers was Hayes Wicker, pastor of First Baptist Church in Naples, which counts Colson, founder of Prison Fellowship, among its members.

Robert George is a Roman Catholic who is a professor at Princeton University and Timothy George is a Southern Baptist who is dean of the Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, Ala.

The result of a September meeting of Christian leaders in Manhattan, from which the document draws its name, the declaration cites the example of apostles Peter and John who refused to stop preaching in spite of an order to do so (Acts 4:1-22) as one biblical warrant for civil disobedience, as well as the case of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” as an “exemplary and inspiring.”

While taking “seriously” the biblical duty to “respect and obey those in authority,” the declaration asserts, “The biblical purpose of law is to preserve order and serve justice and the common good; yet laws that are unjust – and especially laws that purport to compel citizens to do what is unjust – undermine the common good, rather than serve it.”

More fundamentally, the declaration notes, “The nature of religious liberty is grounded in the character of God Himself, the God who is most fully known in the life and work of Jesus Christ. … Thus, the right to religious freedom has its foundation in the example of Christ Himself and in the very dignity of the man person created in the image of God – a dignity, as our founders proclaimed, inherent in every human, and knowable by all in the exercise of right reason.”

In that light, therefore, “Christians confess that God alone is Lord of the conscience. Immunity from religious coercion is the cornerstone of an unconstrained conscience.”

As noted, the matters of grave concern which bring these Christian leaders to the extraordinary place in which they are willing to openly talk about the need for civil disobedience are the sanctity of human life and the definition of marriage—and the possible religious liberty implications of certain laws addressing these matters.

What is particularly helpful about this statement, I believe, is its implicit warning to certain evangelicals who would wish to de-emphasize these issues for the sake of other matters—issues which are worthy of Christian witness and work, but not at the expense of “foundational principles.”

“We argue that there is a hierarchy of issues,” Colson told the New York Times. “A lot of the younger evangelicals say they’re all alike. We’re hoping to educate them that these are the three most important issues.”

The statement notes, “While the whole scope of Christian moral concern, including a special concern for the poor and vulnerable, claims our attention, we are especially troubled that in our nation today the lives of the unborn, the disabled, and the elderly are severely threatened; that the institution of marriage, already buffeted by promiscuity, infidelity and divorce, is in jeopardy of being redefined to accommodate fashionable ideologies; that freedom of religion and the rights of conscience are gravely jeopardized by those who would use the instruments of coercion to compel persons of faith to compromise their deepest convictions.”

The declaration enumerates at length and quite compellingly the dangers to these foundational principles posed by the current governmental, political and cultural environment, demonstrating the need for Christians to speak clearly and with conviction about how they must respond.

If you doubt the relevance of this matter, look no further than the Tampa City Council’s action on Nov. 19 by a 5-1 vote adding “transgendered” persons to the city’s human rights ordinance.

Terry Kemple, member of Bell Shoals Baptist Church in Brandon and leader of Community Issues Council, rightly warned WFTS TV, Tampa’s ABC affiliate, “People of faith who think these sexual decisions don’t belong enshrined in the law are going to be discriminated against for living out their faith.”

Manhattan Declaration (www.ManhattanDeclaration.org) organizers hope to have one million signatures by Dec. 1. As of 4 p.m. Nov. 23 when I completed this column, more than 51,000 persons had added their names (with the numbers growing by the hundreds hourly). I’m among them, and I take quite seriously what I have committed myself to in affirming this statement:

“We pledge to each other, and to our fellow believers, that no power on earth, be it cultural or political, will intimidate us into silence or acquiescence. It is our duty to proclaim the Gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in its fullness, both in season and out of season. May God help us not to fail in that duty.”

The Manhattan Declaration is an extremely important statement that is worthy of the attention and support of all Christians, especially pastors and lay leaders of local churches. I have warned repeatedly – see, particularly, a May 7, 2009, editorial and a Jan. 26, 2009, editorial – about the religious liberty implications of certain public policies, especially those related to abortion and homosexual rights.
These are matters eventually that no true Christian will be able to avoid. Therefore, we ought to resolve now how we will live and witness.
 

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