Well, as we've said, we're looking at the second paragraph of chapter 24 of our confession tonight. We read there, it is lawful for Christians to accept and execute the office of a magistrate when called thereunto. in the management whereof, as they ought especially to maintain justice and peace according to the wholesome laws of each kingdom and commonwealth. So for that end, they may lawfully now, under the New Testament, wage war upon just and necessary occasions. This paragraph shows that it is right and proper for Christians to work for civil authorities and exercise the duties of civil magistracy. In doing so, it outlines the wonderful potential for good in this work, but also the limitations that are placed upon it. Let's look at our subject from this paragraph under three headings. Firstly, the legitimacy of this calling. The legitimacy of the calling of a godly magistrate. It is entirely right and good for a Christian believer to engage in politics. We need to say that and just hold it there in our heads. We've got this idea that politics is in and of itself somehow a dirty profession. That is not true. Politicians may indeed be, quotes, dirty, That's true as individuals. Many of them may be. As a group, the majority of them may be. And I'm not saying they are. I'm saying that is possible. But that does not mean that the work of a politician is an inherently dreadful thing that Christians should avoid. That is not true. It is entirely right and good for a Christian believer to engage in politics and in the broader sense in the civil magistracy, which would include the legal profession or any kind of public service, including the police force or the army. Perhaps I better put this on rather than having it dangling down there. Not doing very well tonight. There we go. Entirely right and good for a Christian believer to engage in politics, the legal profession, or any kind of public service, including the police force or the army. Now, how do we know this? How do we know? Well, we know it for a number of reasons. Firstly, because the work of civil magistracy is a work that God himself has legitimated. We've seen that from paragraph one, haven't we? In our three studies in paragraph one, we've seen that the civil magistrate is answerable to God, the civil magistracy is called by God, and the civil magistracy is empowered by God. that God himself has appointed the civil magistracy. The civil authorities, the state, the government as we know it today, is appointed by God. It's God's idea. It's God's intention that government should function for the good of the people. We've seen that to have a government, however badly they are doing their job, and it's really important we remember this, however badly a government is doing their job, it is always better than anarchy. There is nothing worse than anarchy, literally. Because when anarchy reigns, then sin has free course. And that is the worst of all possible worlds. So God has ordained the civil magistracy. How then can it be illegitimate for a Christian to work in that civil realm? Secondly, we note that it is a work we see many godly men in scripture doing. Even when the person or the rulers who are over them are not godly men themselves. Countless times in scripture we find very godly men, men who are commended for their work, men who are living according to the law of God, men who are pleasing God in their lives, serving in the civil magistracy. We've had these studies, haven't we, in Daniel 1 to 6 already. And here is a man along with his three friends, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and they are all working for the Babylonians, or then for the Medes and Persians. And there is no hint of there being any problem with that. There's no suggestion that they shouldn't be doing it. At no point is it hinted at that Daniel shouldn't be serving Darius. You know, Daniel 6, conclusion. Daniel should never have served Darius in the first place. Is that the conclusion? Is that what we were taught on Sunday evening? No, we were not taught that. At all, because that would be false. It was perfectly right and proper for Daniel to be serving in that capacity, very high up as he was one of the top three men in the kingdom. And Daniel's not the only one, is he? We could think of many examples, but what about Mordecai in Esther? Listen to this about Mordecai in Esther 10. King Ahasuerus, and we know he was a fiery, incendiary, selfish, nasty, despotic piece of work. King Ahasuerus imposed tribute on the land and on the islands of the sea. Now all the acts of his power and his might and the account of the greatness of Mordecai, the Jewish man, to which the king advanced him. Are they not written in the book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Media and Persia? For Mordecai the Jew was second to King Ahasuerus and was great among the Jews and well received by the multitude of his brethren, seeking the good of his people and speaking peace to all his countrymen. Very interesting text, isn't it? Mordecai was elevated to the second highest position in the entire empire under King Ahasuerus who was, quite frankly, a nasty piece of work. And what did Mordecai do? He did good. It was perfectly legitimate for Mordecai to take up that position. And what about Joseph in Genesis 41? Joseph interprets the dream for Pharaoh. And Pharaoh says to him, I want you to be over my house and my people. Genesis 41 verse 40. I want you to be second in the kingdom. I want you to be my prime minister. Now, what does Joseph say? Does Joseph say, no, this is illegitimate. This is against God's law, against God's will. I shouldn't be doing this. It's okay for me to interpret the dream for you and speak God's word to you, but taking part in civil government, no, that's not for anybody who is godly. Joseph doesn't do that. And he's clearly a man of principle, isn't he? He's already walked out on Potiphar's household because the wife tried to defile him. So he's a man of principle. He knows God's law. And he's not gonna do anything that is against God's law. And yet Joseph is more than content to serve Pharaoh. And what does he do serving Pharaoh? He follows the instructions and he Basically, in the end, amongst other things, he feathers Pharaoh's nest, doesn't he? He looks after Pharaoh's interests. He serves him faithfully. Pharaoh ends up owning, basically, all of the land of Egypt, all of the people of Egypt, all of the cattle of Egypt, and this is all Joseph's doing. And you think, how can that be right? It is right. Perfectly good. No hint in scripture that Joseph behaved wrongly. So we know the civil magistracy is legitimate for a godly person. A, because the magistrate itself is ordained by God. B, because many in scripture take up this position and do so with great honor and great commendation in the scriptures. But also thirdly, it is a work that many godly men have taken up down the centuries unto great usefulness. Take a man like Oliver Cromwell, he's been mentioned recently as the last man who cancelled Christmas. How extraordinary that a man of such stature and of such godliness as Cromwell should be remembered for something like that. It's a complete misrepresentation of the man, by the way. No, Oliver Cromwell was responsible for establishing in our country freedom of religion. It was under Cromwell in the 17th century as Lord Protector in that time when there was no king because Charles I had committed treason against his own people and plotted the overthrow of his own people in cahoots with other nations and other groups. He lost his head as a result of that. Cromwell took up the law protectorate and he established freedom of religion in this country. And the principle of freedom of religion has been established ever since. It was under Cromwell that Jews were allowed to be Jews and Roman Catholics were allowed to be Roman Catholics. Quakers were allowed to be Quakers and Baptists were allowed to be Baptists. I mean, back then we would be on the pail and so on. Amazing work that Cromwell did at that and many other things. What about William Wilberforce somewhat later? who was so instrumental in the abolition of the slave trade, and it was his Christian faith and his Christian convictions that drove him on in that battle over many, many decades to bring down that wickedness of the slave trade. Or what about Lord Shaftesbury, who also, as a believer, championed the cause of the oppressed, and working with local hero Robert Peel, engaged to defend the cause of the oppressed, to bring in many laws that reduced the hours of work that people had to work in those days, improved the conditions, made sure they got paid a decent wage, and so on. He did so much good, and he was driven in that by his faith. So it is entirely legitimate for godly Christian people to be engaged in the civil magistrate, or to use more contemporary terminology, to be involved in public service, to be employed by the state, to do work on behalf of the state. But notice here, in this paragraph, the wording that is used, it is lawful for Christians to accept and execute the office of a magistrate when called to it. When they are called to it. Called by whom? Called by whom? Well, not called by the authorities, but called by God. The writers of our confession, whenever they use a phrase like this, called unto something, they are referring to the divine calling. and the reformers and the Puritans had this tremendously high view of a Christian's calling. It was Luther who began this process, wasn't he? When he referred to the scullery maid, or the launderer, or the housewife at the kitchen sink, or the person mucking out the pigs, or whatever the job was, whatever a Christian does in his life, he is called to it by God. Paul brings this out, doesn't he, in Colossians 3, when we do everything we do as unto the Lord, even if it's mucking out the pigs die. We do it as unto the Lord. Why? Because we are called unto it by God. And here is this recognition that there is a calling to the office of the civil magistracy. This is a vocation. And some Christians are called to this vocation. I wonder if anybody listening to this might think to themselves, maybe that's me. Maybe this is something that God is calling me to at this time. Somehow today we've lost this sense of vocation and calling as Christians in the general sense. Yes, we recognize that there is a calling to the ministry and that's quite right. There is a calling to the ministry, but then everything else is just a job. That's not how our forefathers in the faith saw it. Everything is a calling. And to be engaged in civil magistracy, to work as a servant of the state, to be a public servant, is a calling. And it's a very important one. And Christians need to consider, am I called to this? Sproul has this very helpful quote on this point. He says, the Reformation concept of vocation, which has been largely obscured in our culture today. The idea of vocation is that God calls people to their life's work in many different spheres. God gifts people in different ways. And it is not only church-related jobs that are to be considered a calling or a vocation. Just as God calls people to the gospel ministry, so he also calls the ministers of the state to perform their tasks. He calls farmers to farming, businessmen to business, artists to art. The first people said to be filled with the Holy Spirit were the artisans whom God called to fashion the holy vessels and the furniture for the tabernacle in the Old Testament, Exodus 31. The spirit did not come upon them to preach the gospel or to minister as priests and prophets. The spirit gifted them to produce works of art, to be musicians and to be sculptors. And then he says something that might jar with us a little bit, but it's really important. As Christians, we should think of our careers as vocations. We should be a banker because God calls us to be a banker. If banking is a legitimate enterprise, and it is by the way, and contributes to the general welfare of human beings, which it definitely does, then it is a legitimate sphere of labor in which a Christian may be engaged. God's will and does call his people to be bankers as well as to be civil servants, servants of the state in the broadest possible sense. So it is entirely legitimate for Christians to be public servants, even when the people for whom they work are not believers. And even when the political situation in which they find themselves is far from holy. So the legitimacy of the godly magistrate. Secondly, the potential of the godly magistrate, the potential. In such a position and calling, there is great potential for good. And there may be many different aspects to this work of civil service. Depending on the particular responsibilities and the job description, it can include all the most obvious forms of public service, But there is a special focus here that our forefathers in the faith bring out. And what they bring out reflects the biblical priorities, which might not necessarily be our priorities. I wonder, when you think about politics, when you think about government, what do you think are their top priorities? What are the number one, number two, number three? Well, here they are in this paragraph. And it's really important that we understand the priorities of government, of the civil authorities, and get them in their biblical order, and don't put them in a different order. What is the first thing here? It is justice. In the management whereof, as they ought especially to maintain justice. Justice is right up there. So to work in parliament, For justice is to work towards, in many ways, the highest calling of the public realm, to establish justice. to work in the courts or to work in the police force and to establish justice in these realms or in any other particular aspect of public service where justice is what is in view, that should be something that Christians are particularly drawn towards. Historically, there's been a disproportionate number of Christians working in the law courts and in parliament. and in the police force, because Christians ought to have a particular concern that justice be done. Turn with me to 2 Samuel 23, this is a passage that the writers of the Confession themselves highlight in the texts. 2 Samuel 23, David speaking as king, He says, verse 1, now these are the last words of David. Thus says David, the son of Jesse. Thus says the man raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob and the sweet psalmist of Israel. The spirit of the Lord spoke by me and his word was on my tongue. The God of Israel said, the rock of Israel spoke to me. He who rules over men must be, what's the first thing he must be? He must be just. ruling in the fear of God and if he is just. He shall be like the light of the morning when the sun rises, a morning without clouds, like the tender grass springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain. Justice is number one. One of the great problems we have in politics today is that number one is utility. Our politics is entirely utilitarian. What is going to work? What is going to do the most good, however that is defined? That is not where we begin. We begin with what is just, what is right. That's God's number one priority, justice. And that's the first calling of any civil magistrate is to establish justice. And then on the back of justice comes peace. Are you hearing Bible texts in your mind? Righteousness and peace, justice and peace. And these are to go together. If there is to be peace, there must be justice. True justice will produce peace. Now peace is broader than justice. It feeds out from justice, it depends on justice, but it's broader than justice. Included in peace would be things like social equity, perhaps foster care of needy children, perhaps conflict resolution, preventing divorces, caring for the vulnerable, religious liberty, freedom of speech. Even economic prosperity and healthcare can be included in the outworking of the concept of peace. All those things which lead to peace and foster peace and produce peace. But you can't have it without justice. Justice has to come first. If you seek peace by bypassing justice, you will do more harm than good. And that is why if you put healthcare above justice, if you put education above justice, if you put social action above justice, then you'll get it all wrong. That's one of the things that's gone wrong with our government for many, many years now, not just this government, but government upon government upon government upon government have got this wrong. They have minimized justice. Justice and righteousness and truth, what is right and good and true is to be set aside for the sake of pursuing peace and prosperity. It's the wrong way around. But nonetheless, the pursuit of peace is still a good thing. As long as it's under justice, as long as it feeds out from justice, it must be good. We turn to Psalm 82, another text which is quoted here. Psalm 82, verse 1, God stands in the congregation of the mighty. He judges among the gods in inverted commas. This is a reference to the great of this age, those who have power and authority. And God says, how long will you judge unjustly? Notice where God begins. He begins with justice. How long will you judge unjustly, which leads to or manifests itself in showing partiality to the wicked? Which then means that the poor and the fatherless are not defended. You must defend the poor and the fatherless. You must do justice to the afflicted and the needy. You must deliver poor and needy and free them from the hand of the wicked. Can you see how justice is producing peace here? How do you get harmony between the poor and the rich? Only if there is justice, only if there is equity, and that then produces peace. It produces harmony. When the wicked are punished and the poor and the fatherless are defended, you have justice that produces peace. And this concern for peace is very much on Paul's mind in 1 Timothy 2 when he calls Timothy to pray for all those who are in authority for kings. That we may lead, verse 2, a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. That we may lead a quiet and peaceable life. It is good to pursue peace. What potential for good there is when you have a civil magistrate who is a Christian, who is always seeking what is just, what is right, what is good in order to produce peace. But what happens when the peace is broken by wicked men? Well, the magistrate then must launch his war against the wicked. And that warfare, as we've seen already from paragraph 1, the wielding of the power of the sword, which God has given to the magistrate, may need to be done within the realm, or it may need to be done to defend the realm. But whether it is done by the police force wielding the sword, or the army wielding the sword, it is all legitimate. And so we read at the end of paragraph two, they may lawfully now, under the New Testament, wage war upon just and necessary occasions. They have the authority to do that. And so it is perfectly permissible for a Christian to be in the police force, to be in the marksman armed unit of the police force, and if necessary, to shoot and kill a criminal. on orders and it is perfectly legitimate for a Christian to be in the army and to pick up his weapons and to kill the enemy. This is ordained by God. This is a public service which these men do. So in Romans 13, we've already studied this, but just to remind you of this text, Romans 13, 3 and 4, rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same, for he is God's minister to you for good. But if you do evil, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is God's minister. So the civil magistracy, the government, the civil authority as a whole has the right to wield the sword. But that means that particular individual human beings will have to hold the sword and thrust the sword and use it to kill. And that is entirely legitimate. In fact, when you think of all the acts of public service to which a person can be called, there is no act of public service which carries with it a higher cost than this, is there? When we send our young men to war to fight, they put their lives on the line. And I don't want to be overly political at this point, but is it really right that these men should be paid so little and treated with so little respect in our culture when these are the people who are risking their lives for our safety under the legitimate calling of God? I think it's something we should consider. So there is justice, there is peace. This sometimes means that warfare has to be waged and that's perfectly legitimate. But all of this, going back to the context of paragraph one, is for the public good. That God is glorified in the public good. And that is really the summary calling to which every Christian magistrate says his Amen. If I work for the state, if I am called to be a public servant, then my calling is unto the public good. I want to do good, I am here to do good. And it is this that every public servant, everybody who works for the public authorities should be striving for this. It's very interesting, the book of Proverbs speaks so much about the righteous king. And really, when you read king in Proverbs, we can broaden that out. It's anybody in authority, any public servant really. So let's substitute that public servant for king here. So Proverbs 16 verse 12, it is an abomination for public servants to commit wickedness. For a throne is established by righteousness. We must pursue what is right, what is good, what is just. Proverbs 20 verse 28, mercy and truth preserve the public servant. And by loving kindness, he upholds his power, his authority. Wow, if that were written above every public office and followed, we would do a lot better than we do today. Or Proverbs 29, Proverbs 29, verse 4, the public servant establishes the land by justice, but he who receives bribes overthrows it. And verse 14, the public servant who judges the poor with truth, his authority will be established forever. So this is the calling of public office. It's a great calling. It's a noble thing to which believers ought to aspire. And there's tremendous potential here, isn't there? Since the objective under God, to whom you will answer ultimately, since all authority, even in the civil realm, comes from God, God has called you to do what? To pursue the public good. And that's your job if you work, as we say today, for the public sector. That's your job, is to pursue the good of your fellow citizens. But not only do you pursue the good of your fellow citizens in the direct job which you have, your job description, but you pursue the good of your fellow citizens as a public servant simply by being a Christian in that context. Now this is true of every Christian, wherever you are, whether we're in the private sector or the public sector, it applies to all Christians. But thinking about Christians working in the public sector now, what does this mean? There's a remarkable passage in Luke 3, isn't there, where John the Baptist is speaking to categories of public servant. And he says, Verse 10, while the people are asking, what shall we do? And he said to them, he who has two tunics, let him give to him who has none. He who has food, let him do likewise. Then the tax collectors, public servants, also came to be baptized and said to him, teacher, what shall we do? And he said to them, collect no more than what is appointed for you. It's a remarkable answer, isn't it? He doesn't say. Give up the civil magistracy. You're working for dirty people and it's dirty money and they're spending the taxes on all the wrong things. Give it up now. Walk out. Leave your job. He doesn't say that does he? He says do your job but do it justly. Do it rightly. Do it honourably. Do it before the Lord. Don't lie in your pockets. Just be a Christian. as a public servant. Or verse 14, the soldiers asked him, saying, and what shall we do? And he said to them, leave the army immediately. Put your swords up, never fight again. This is not what he says, is it? And John the Baptist was a pretty fiery guy. He certainly wasn't afraid to tell people what they should and shouldn't do. After all, he said to Herod, you're committing adultery being with your brother's wife. You need to put her away. So he was bold. But he says, he doesn't say that to them. He says, do not intimidate anyone or accuse falsely and be content with your wages. Be content with your wages. Wow. Let's not go too much into that one, but what is he saying? He's simply saying, be a Christian, be a servant of God, be godly in your work. And as you work in the civil realm, you'll make a difference, you'll do good. Just be a beatitudinal person. Be the kind of person described in Matthew 5, poor in spirit, mourning for sin, meek, considering others more important than yourself, hungry and thirsting for what is right, being merciful, showing pity and kindness, having a pure heart, seeking peace, and being ready to suffer persecution. This is how we fulfill our potential for good in public service. Think about a Daniel, how much good did he do? Think about Mordecai, how much good did he do? Through Mordecai the entire Jewish race was saved. It's because of what Mordecai and Esther did that Jesus could be born. Big deal. Serious public good done because of the way that they lived. Joseph, look at him saving the then known world from famine. and particularly important, his own family through whom Christ would come. So much good was done. Look at a Cromwell. So much good was done. Look at a Wilberforce. So much good was done. A Shaftesbury. So much good was done. Just these three men together. Millions of people across the Western world today benefit from the work of these three men. If it's freedom of worship, freedom of religion, we owe it to a man like Cromwell. If it's the freedom from slavery and freedom to be subjected to enforce slavery, we owe it to a Wilberforce. If it's all the multiplicity of laws that protect the downtrodden and the poor and the abused and the suffering, it's a Lord Shaftesbury. We owe it to him. So much good done by Christians in public service down through the centuries. We seem to have forgotten this today. And it's really important that we think about it, the potential for good. But thirdly, finally, not only legitimacy of the godly magistrate and the potential of the godly magistrate, but finally the boundary of the godly magistracy. And this is something we're gonna come back to when we look at paragraph three. But let's introduce it. There is a clear boundary for the Christian working in the public sector. And that boundary needs to be drawn very clearly. Remember back to the title for this section from chapter 21 of the confession onwards, God-centered living, freedom and boundaries. Yes, the Christian is free to work as a public servant and to center on God in what he's doing as a public servant, but there must be a boundary around what he's doing. And he must not cross that boundary. Now, there's two aspects to this boundary. The first is a general thing. The first boundary concerns the extent of the powers that any civil authority is able to exercise under God. Remember what we've said from paragraph one. The civil magistracy is of God. The civil magistracy is legitimized by God, answerable to God, called by God, empowered by God. And what the magistrate then can and cannot do is determined by God. God decides that. He's under God and he will answer to God. And we'll look at the detail of that in paragraph 3, but what we've already seen from paragraphs 1 and 2 is what he is to do is to pursue the public good by rewarding the good, punishing the evil, establishing justice, promoting peace, launching warfare upon evil. This is the calling of the civil magistracy. It's very specific and it's really quite narrow. It's a lot narrower than we today think it is. The boundary around what civil government should be concerning itself with is a lot smaller than we in our culture today believe it to be. And we've got to be biblical here, not just accepting the way our culture thinks and behaves. Remember that the civil authority is just that, it is civil. Their power is limited to the civil realm. This means they have no authority in the spiritual realm at all. None. The civil authorities have no right to interfere in any way in what is done in the spiritual realm. That's really important. So any civil magistrate who's a Christian and sees the civil magistracy crossing that boundary, no. No, we don't go there. It means that the civil magistracy must not overreach itself. It must not stray out of the civil realm into the spiritual realm. It must rather fulfill its calling to ensure that there is full freedom in the spiritual realm. For those to whom God has given authority in the spiritual realm to do their spiritual work and furthermore, A godly magistrate will be very concerned to make it explicit that what the civil realm is doing does not have the power to save, does not have the power to bless, and does not have the power to touch the spiritual realm at all. This is so important. Today, government gives us the impression that they have the power and the right to do things that they do not have the power or the right to do. The government cannot save you. The government cannot preserve your life. In whose hands is your life? God's hands. The government is not God. And one fears today that government sets itself up as being like unto God with a small g. We have the power to save. They don't. They never did. They never will. Their power is much less than they give the impression of it being. And because they're constantly overreaching the legitimacy of their power, this causes so much trouble. Now a Christian magistrate will understand that. A Christian magistrate will understand all the time, hold on guys, what we can do here is far less than what we're giving the impression of. We need to rein ourselves in. And that is one thing that modern governments need to do in the West. We need to rein ourselves in. We need, as Christians, to promote a much more minimalist view of the state. We should expect far less from the state than we do. The state does not have the power to do all the things it claims it can do. We should expect far less from the state and far more from the church. Far less from the state and far more from families. Far less from the state and far more from individual citizens. That is biblical. The Bible expects far more from the individual citizen and far more from the family and far more from the church than it does from the civil authorities. And that's a shift of mindset, isn't it? A couple of quotes on this which I think are helpful. The first from Augustine. Augustine says, civil government is a necessary evil made necessary because of evil. We are sinners and we have a propensity to violate other human beings, to commit injustices or cause bodily harm. We may take property or threaten life and people need to be protected by the civil magistrate who is instituted and ordained by God to bear the sword. The magistrate has legitimate power and authority to protect us from one another. You see, our fathers in the faith had a much, much lesser view of how much the state should be doing. According to Augustine, the state should be protecting us basically from killing one another, or from stealing from one another, or from doing evil towards one another, and then enabling us to be free to do good under our own steam, full stop. That was their view. Not all the million and one things we expect the state to be doing today. This was Francis Schaeffer writing in the 1970s in America. He said that his biggest concern for the church and for the people of the United States was what he called statism. the increasing encroachment and dominion of the federal government in the lives of people, in the school, in the community, in the church, in all areas. One cannot turn around without bumping into the federal government. That was his major concern, and since he said that, the intrusion of the federal government in the lives of people has greatly increased. That's R.C. Sproul. And since Schaeffer and since Sproul, it's got worse, hasn't it? A lot worse. So the Christian magistrate understands what is not the role of the state, draws that boundary, and calls us to a much more minimalist view. What the state can do, what the state should do, what the state can achieve, and what it should be preoccupying itself with is often different to what they're doing and less than what they're trying to do. And if they did what God called them to do, and they applied themselves to that rather than all the other things that they think they should be doing, they would do it a lot better. So don't invite the state to do more than God has called it to do. and suspect any civil authorities that promise more than they can deliver. How many political manifestos have to fall flat on their face again and again, election after election after election, before we will wake up to the fact that they are all promising far more than they can ever deliver. And the thing is, they shouldn't be promising it. Those political manifestos should be about, I don't know, a hundredth of the length that they are. let's be honest about what the state can do. The Christian magistrate understands that. But the second aspect of the boundary he draws concerns his own behavior. And this is the thing that we will come back to. The behavior of the public servant, the individual Christian working for the public sector, the behavior of that Christian will have a boundary around it. I will draw a boundary around what I am prepared to do, and that is the boundary of God's law. I will be bounded by the law of God. I will work within the civil magistracy. I will work as a public servant within the law of God, and I will not cross the boundary ever once for any reason. Now, that is where the individual Christian working for the state must stand. It is, as we have here in paragraph two, according to the wholesome laws of each kingdom and commonwealth that we operate. It is according to conscience, paragraph three, that we operate, yielding obedience to the Lord, paragraph three, that we function. So what does this mean? What do we need to do? Well, there's three things, and I'll draw to a conclusion with these three things. They're really, really important. I'll just bullet point them, and we'll come back to them. One, we need to know the law of God. We need to know it. So many Christians are ignorant of what the Bible teaches about all the stuff and nonsense that's out there today. We need to know the law of God. We need to be lawyers. Bible lawyers. We need to have an excellent understanding of what the Bible teaches on all the key issues of the day. We need to know it inside out and upside down. We need to be absolutely crystal clear on these things. Especially those contentious things that are being actively promoted in our utterly godless society. What does the Bible teach about abortion? We need to be absolutely crystal clear on that. What does the Bible teach about contraception? Are you crystal clear on it? What does the Bible teach about sexuality? What does the Bible teach about gender? category that has been created today that never existed before. What does the Bible teach about marriage? About relationships? About personal identity? And so on and so on and so on and so on. We need to know very clearly what the Bible teaches. Get that picture from Sunday night in your head. It's not just that Boris Johnson and the cabinet sitting around that table should have the Ten Commandments up on the wall and should check everything they do against those Ten Commandments. That is absolutely true. But as Christians, we should be checking everything we're asked to do, particularly if we work in the public sector. We should be checking everything we are asked to do against the law of God. We need to understand God's law. Think about a man like William Wilberforce fighting against a massive, overwhelming public opinion which said that the slave trade was fine. How was he able to keep fighting and fighting and fighting and fighting and fighting against that because he knew the law of God, he knew it was wrong. You've got to be a man or a woman of conviction. We need to know God's law and we need to say, this is what God says. Secondly, we need to know really clearly. No fuzziness, no generalities, no confusion, no gray area. We need to know really clearly what we are being asked to condone, what we are being asked to support, and what we are being asked to do. So many Christians live in fuzz land. Well, I'm not entirely sure what I'm being asked to do here, so I'll do it, hoping it isn't so bad. They have a fuzzy view of God's law. They don't really know what the Bible says. They have a fuzzy view of what they're being asked to do and they just meander along. We need to have a crystal clear understanding of what God's law is and we need to have an equally clear view of what we are being asked to do. We must not believe what we are told on the BBC. or on ITV, or on Channel 4, or on Facebook, or on YouTube, or wherever you get your news. Don't believe what you're told. These are the people who hate God. These are the people who say, fact, there is no God. Fact, the world is billions of years old. Fact, you can have a woman's body and actually be a man and the other way around. Fact, fact, fact, fact. Saying as facts things that we know are not true from Scripture. Why then do we believe everything else they tell us? Why do you turn on these news media and believe them? Question it. Of course, some of the things they say will be true. Some of them won't be. How do you know the difference? We've got to be clear. We've got to know. And when it comes to what we're being asked to do in the workplace and in our job, we've got to know, does this support? A way of thinking, and a way of living, and a way of behaving that is anti-God. Well, that is not the public good then. You cannot do it. And that's the third thing. Once we know what God's law is, and once we know what we're being asked to do, then we draw a boundary around what we are being asked to do, and we ask, is it outside or is it inside? And if it's outside, we simply don't do it. We say no. And we don't say no quietly. We just say no. We don't have to put it on Facebook. You don't have to put it on social media. You just have to tell the person who is asking you to do. whatever it is that is against God's law, you simply say to them, I'm not doing that, and I'm not doing it because it's against the law of God. And the law of God is the public good. The law of God is justice. The law of God is peace. The law of God is righteousness. The law of God is goodness. The law of God is truth. And you are asking me to go against God's law, and I will not do it. And if that means that you're going to discipline me, I will take the discipline. And if that means you're going to sack me, I will take the sack. Look at Daniel, that was his position. Look at Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, Daniel three, that was their position, it must be ours. But we can't do that if we don't know exactly what God's law says about a thing and exactly what it is we're being asked to do. And then we can say yes or no or ask further questions because it's not clear, whatever it is, we get clarity and then we do. what is right. Well, we'll come back and look at these things again. They're so important. Let's pray.