Romans chapter 13, which we read a moment ago, will be our primary text today as we continue on learning about a just society. The Spirit's prophetic word tells us in Hosea chapter 12, verse six, so you, by the help of your God, return, hold fast to love and justice, and wait continually for your God. When we hear those kinds of instructions, we want to say, yes, Lord. We want to be doers of the word and not hearers only. We want to respond to that, to hold fast to love and justice, to return to the Lord. The prophets call us to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. That's revealed in Jesus. So we live and we long for a just world with Jesus at its heart. That's what we've been looking at together. What might that look like? We've described so far, based on God's work of creation and redemption, the church as the soul of a just human community by the power of the Spirit. Life in Christ then brings its healing and its wholeness out to every aspect of human society, starting with the fundamental social unit. The family, as God designed it to be, is fundamental to social justice. But there's more, and that's what we're working on now. We need to take this vision of a just world with Jesus at its heart to all the nations. We are responsible to disciple all the nations, mankind, in his social, political, economic, cultural ways. We want a just society. It is good for us to call the world to this. So last Lord's Day, we tried to get our minds around a little bit of this vast reality. Pardon me. If you want to answer difficult questions, if you want to act faithfully in difficult situations, you need to stay really focused on what's really real, what's actually true. And so we can live that way, pursue that. So we started from the concrete reality that Jesus is Lord. That's concrete reality. That's what God has brought about in Earth's history, among the nations. He has exalted Jesus Christ as Lord of all. And based on that reality, we articulated four other social realities. First, our good is in God. That is, we talk about the common good that precedes us, so to speak, as individuals, that binds us together in something bigger than ourselves. What is that ultimately but God? We were made for him and we find that together as we live for him. Number two, authority then is good. We want God's authority operative in every way throughout the whole earth. True religion is necessary to adjust society. And lastly, society actually works by serving one another. This is the way true human community comes about when we are serving one another. But it's one thing to talk about those kinds of principles in that way, which are all good and necessary, in fact, vital to us pursuing what is truly good together. But moving from the challenge or taking up that challenge to move from the principle level, so to speak, to actual practice level, or the principle level to actual policy level in a human society can be very, very difficult. That requires an immense amount of wisdom. So we are going to seek wisdom today by listening carefully to what God has to say to us. If we're going to gain wisdom, a wise person listens. And I think it's very important that we listen carefully to scripture to begin taking wise steps. If you're, in a sense, a thousand miles from where you ought to be, it can be overwhelming. Like, what should be the first, what do we even begin to do here when we're nowhere near what God calls us to be as a human society or civilization? Where do we start? How do we take a step in the right direction toward a just society? I would submit to you as we look at the scripture today that the answer might surprise you, but it is written on the pages of scripture over and over again. It's not, for example, we just prayed in our hymn together that God's word would be our law, that God's word would be our instruction, that it would guide our society, that it would tell us what to do together. That's a good prayer request, actually. That's really the way things ought to be. Is that where we start? Well, we're gonna make God's word our law. Actually, that's not where we start, scripturally speaking, and we can use other examples. But when we look at the instructions God has given to us about how to pursue a just society, one command is given repeatedly, and it's given repeatedly as a function of a larger reality that we are to live in. So here's the command that we see over and over in the pages of the New Testament. Be subject. When the New Testament turns our attention toward how are you going to pursue a just society as citizens of the kingdom of heaven? Be subject. That's what it says. And then it does that in light of this larger reality, love. Love your neighbor. Romans 13 is an excellent example of this kind of instruction. We just read it out loud together a moment ago. Pardon me. Here we are told that every soul is to be put or arranged or designed, ordered under the surpassing authorities. These authorities that are always operative in this world in all kinds of levels, but it talks specifically about the higher ones, the surpassing ones. And by the way, just let me draw your attention to even the way this is worded in the scripture. You might think this is kind of a very vague kind of statement, authorities. Right? Okay, be subject to the authorities. Well, who are they? What are they? There's all kinds of things we could talk about here, but notice that this is just simply, and notice the plural there as well, authorities. This is simply a function of human society. It always exists in every human society. It existed from Adam and Eve in the garden. You can't be a human or have a human society without these kinds of things coming about in God's providence and by us acting as humans. So, be ordered under the surpassing authorities. Why? Because authority is not except from God. Every soul is to be subject to the governing authorities because authority is not except from God. And then after expounding on all that, the scripture moves right into, oh no one anything except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. In fact, verse 10 says, love does no wrong to a neighbor, therefore love is the fulfilling of the law. Here we have these two instructions laid out for us, be subject and love. So let's look first of all at be subject. being subject, the Holy Spirit tells us, to these higher authorities. I hope you noticed already, as we started to look at this passage, that the reason the Scripture gives for being subject to higher authorities is that this is actually the way the world works. And again, the Scripture is really saying to you, I want you to live in reality. Quit living in a dream world. Quit making up your own world that you think should exist or that you want to exist. Live in the way the world actually works. How is that? God is the sole source of authority. That's the way it actually works. There is no authority except from God. It all starts with him. And that is absolutely fundamental to understanding what we're going to be talking about here. God is the sole source of authority. And then all the authorities that actually exist in the world have their existence from God. The application then, in verse 2, therefore, is that those who set themselves against the authorities set themselves against God's ordering of the world, and they will receive judgment. If you set yourself against the authorities, you're actually setting yourself against the way the world works. You're trying to live in make-believe, and that's not going to accomplish God's good purposes here. That's not what we're being called to as Christians. But as soon as we read this, and we, and I think every one of you know this from long experience, we ask ourselves, is this really wise? Like, it just said that, like, just be subject to the surpassing authorities. I mean, after all, we live in a sinful world, right? Full of all kinds of authorities who do wrong. Why would the scripture make such blanket statements like this? In fact, shouldn't we qualify the command to say something like, under normal circumstances, you should be subject to the authorities, but not necessarily, right? All things being equal, you should, but not necessarily. Maybe we could make up something like that. I want to provoke us today. So I want to say, no, we should not qualify this command. In fact, I want to say we don't need to qualify it. We need to deepen it. We need to press into the reality that it's opening up for us so that we can live in it as God's people. In other words, many people might say we should be subject to higher authorities as long as they don't tell us to sin. But then in those instances when they do tell us to sin, for example, we don't need to be subject to them at that point. I disagree, not because I don't think that statement is trying to work toward the truth, but that it doesn't capture the truth entirely. I think the reality is much more interesting than that. So in order to deepen our understanding, permit me to reiterate some things that we have already said in our sermon series here. We said as a gift from the good God, there's an inherent unity to everything in this world. God said it is good, it's harmonious. Everything is made to give and to receive in ways that open up further giving and receiving. Everything is made to move toward union with God together. Mankind is made in the image of God as an inherently social, spiritual creature. And we were made for union with God. That's why all of this exists. That's why human society exists. We don't exist outside of that context. In a sense, again, it precedes us. It's given to us. It's a gift from God. The basic reality of this world is friendship and peace. Because the basic reality of all things is love in God. And this is the truth of things. When we claim this today, and I'm going to slow down here and try to reiterate these things because I think they're hard for us to get into our minds. They're not the way we naturally think as disordered creatures, that this is the truth of the world. It's the way things actually are as they are made to be. And it's demonstrated then and effected in Jesus Christ. What God created, he didn't just leave, especially after sin. He actually demonstrates its ordering to Christ and effects the reality that he designed in Jesus Christ. In his person and work, Jesus Christ brings to fulfillment all of God's good designs for friendship, for peace, for love. Remember we said, by the way, that all justice comes from God and is inherently then connected to goodness and truth? That's what all things take their bearings from. They can't exist if they don't. And what's happening then in the world is God's authority is radiating out like sunlight, shining light and goodness everywhere it goes, and it's not in competition with other authorities. God never says, I'm the authority, therefore there are no other authorities. He actually says, I'm the authority, therefore there are multitudes of other authorities. In fact, this is all a communication of my authority. You get to participate in it. Do you see how generous God is? It's not us versus Him. It's Him sharing life with us and us getting to participate with Him. The world is not fundamentally about competition. It's fundamentally about love. Pardon me. God's authority graciously generates authorities so that his love and his goodness is operative in every relationship, and that's what makes freedom possible. Authority consists in bearing witness to the truth, and the truth sets us free. This is all good. It's wonderful, actually. It's astonishingly freeing. And this is in contrast to the way sin and idolatry make us think about social relationships. Again, we said last week, one of our fundamental truths, realities, society works by serving one another. That's actually how human communities work. The world thinks that society works by competing with one another for scarce resources. And in this kind of idle, distorted view of the world, being subject can only be understood in terms of competition. Competition for space, competition for agency, competition for ability to do things. I've got to fight to keep you off my territory, so to speak. That's how I'm free. By fighting to keep you off my territory. And if you encroach on my territory, well now, now I'm not free, so to speak. That's how the world perceives things. But, well, I should say this, government, in that kind of a conception, or the state, as it is often but incorrectly called, inaccurately called, is then inherently coercion. That's what government is. It is coercion. And of course, then the goal is to have as little of it as possible. Because we don't want coercion in our lives, right? We want to be free, as we like to think of it, to do what I want to do. That's the way the world perceives things. That's the way the natural man perceives things. But God is working. God is injecting into this whole world system that works, tries to work that way, the Spirit-empowered body of Christ to reveal how twisted that view of life is. And it's by being subject that we actually reorient the world toward life in the kingdom of God. God is telling us, live like citizens of the kingdom, because this is how life really works. So let's elevate our own thinking about subjection. In fact, we could even start with thinking about the concept we're working with to begin with. And I believe a good word to communicate what this word in Scripture is dealing with is subordinate, to order, arrange, under. That's what we're being called to do. You can look at many instances of this concept in the New Testament, and let me just share a few of these so we can start thinking about the variety of ways that this is talked about in scripture. The first time we see it in the New Testament, Jesus ordered himself under his parents in Luke chapter 2. He subordinated himself to them. Now, in a very different context, in Romans 8, verse 7, it says, the mind set on the flesh does not order itself under the law of God. Indeed, it cannot. That's the mind set on the flesh. It can't see the goodness of God's instructions, God's laws, and arrange itself under them. Instead, it opposes them. Here's another interesting example. In 1 Corinthians chapter 14, verse 32, the spirits of the prophets are ordered under the prophets. And here's a favorite one in the New Testament. All things are ordered under Jesus' feet. You see it in 1 Corinthians and Ephesians and Hebrews. As the fulfillment of even what the Psalms were talking about in Psalm 2. Jesus, as the ultimate man, has had all things arranged, put in place, ordered properly under his feet. Now, that works itself out then. Here's an interesting one. In 1 Corinthians 16, as the Apostle Paul is giving concluding instructions, he tells the believers to be ordered under be subordinated to those who devote themselves to the service of the saints and to every fellow worker and laborer. You are to arrange your life in such a way that you are under all these people who are devoting themselves to the service of Jesus Christ. In Ephesians chapter five, being filled with the spirit, issues in ordering ourselves under one another And then, wives are to order themselves under their own husbands. Of course, that instruction is repeated often, Colossians 3, Titus 2, 1 Peter 3. Slaves are to order themselves under their masters, according to Titus 2 and 1 Peter 2. They subordinate themselves. And then in 1 Peter 5, we read, the younger, in the church here, are to order themselves under the elder, with everyone being clothed with humility. That's the way the church is supposed to work. Younger, ordered under the elder. Pardon me. And I believe that's especially spiritually speaking there. But everyone here is then clothed with humility. So how could we sum that up? Think with me as I say it this way. To be subordinated means you have someone or multiple someones, another as your originating principle for practical action in that relationship so that you can walk together in the truth. God has placed, multiple authorities in our lives to communicate his truth to us so that we can cooperate, work together in the truth and in his goodness. And in fact, that's exactly what the biblical conception of obedience is. Titus 3.1 links these ideas when it says, remind them to be submissive, that's our term again here, submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work. Perhaps some of you who are here a while back when we talked about children obey your parents in Ephesians 6.4 might remember some of this, but I think it's very applicable here. Obedience can and should be in the truth. to the truth, Galatians chapter five. From the heart, Ephesians chapter six. Pardon me. And the very fact that it's talked about as obedience to the truth and from the heart tells us this is not merely about actions. It's not such a surface level thing. It's about our whole persons being engaged in the truth and the goodness together. So this is how obedience works. It's even suggested, by the way, by the basic meaning of that term obedience, which means to listen to. Authorities communicate good to someone so that he can responsibly participate in that good. Direction is given from one to another to work together in this goodness, in God's wisdom in Christ. Because in Christ, obedience is not a zero-sum game. It's not a tug of war. It's not primarily a power relation of two impenetrable and autonomous selves battling it out for who gets to be on top. It's a form of union. It's putting your souls and lives together in the goodness of God, in the common good, we call it. And we respond, when an authority communicates that to us, we respond by joyfully participating in it. Jesus Christ himself set the perfect example for us in this, as is talked about in Philippians chapter 2. Jesus obeyed, it says, and his entire way of thinking or his mindset is to be ours. And this shows in the characteristics listed in the verses in that chapter. We could say that when we obey authorities, We are seeking union of mind, love, and soul in the faith. When we obey authorities, we are avoiding strife and conceit, and we are exercising lowliness of mind and counting others as having superiority to ourselves. When we obey authorities, we realize they are looking out not for themselves, but for others. That's what we're doing. This is the mindset of Jesus Christ. Obedience aims at entering into union with the authorities in the authority of Jesus Christ. It aims at entering into union with the authorities in the mission of Jesus Christ. That's what authorities are for. All of your personal powers exercise to carry out the mission entrusted to you by the authorities. You advance the mission of Christ, Christ's headship over all the universe, by taking your place of active participation in the spirit. And one of the obvious things this means for us as we think about being subject is that you are invested in the relationship. As soon as the Bible tells you be subject to the authorities, it's telling you you're an intrinsic part of this relationship. If this relationship is going to work, you've got to do what it takes to make this relationship work. You can't check out, so to speak, and say, well, that authority over there You're in this together. You want it to succeed in achieving real goodness together. And too often, even Christians speak of surpassing authorities, again, on every level. Don't just think in terms of the governmental structures we have today, although that would be a good application for us, but realize this is a bigger picture than just that. Too often, Christians speak of surpassing authorities in ways that betray an us versus them kind of a mindset. It's them over there that are doing these things, not us. But that's not the way God pictures human society. It's not the way we, even redeemed in Christ, should picture human society. We should realize it's togetherness. And you can see this understanding is working its way out when we go on to verses three through five in in Romans chapter 13, for it says, explaining further, for rulers are not a terror to good conduct or to the good work, literally, but to bad or evil. Rulers are not a terror to the good work, 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. Let's just pause right there. Pardon me. The authorities are God's servants, right? Where do they get their authority from? It can't be anywhere else. It's gotta be from God. They're God's servants. And what are they intended to accomplish? Here's the purpose, the goal kind of a statement being made. For good. That's what they're there for. In fact, for everybody's good. That's why God puts these authorities in place. That's what they're supposed to achieve. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain, for he is the servant of God. Again, that point emphasized, he is the servant of God. An avenger, or we, maybe it helps to think about that term by just one who procures justice, somebody who procures justice, who carries out God's wrath, that is God's punishment, on the evildoer, the wrongdoer. And so to draw the conclusion here in verse 5, one must be in subjection. Again, this is just the way God set up the world to work. Don't fight against the way God set up the world to work. In fact, show the world how this is supposed to work. Not only for the sake of wrath, to avoid God's wrath, communicated through his servants, but also, it says here, for the sake of conscience. For the sake of, I'm gonna give a real literal translation of this term, seeing together. And the reason I do that is because you notice the togetherness again, brought out here. That's what con-science, even in that Latinized form of the word, is about. We are knowing things together. Why do I bring that out? Because when a lot of people today read that term conscience, they think of some private inner sanctum that's just me and God and has nothing to do with anything outside of that. And I don't think that's actually the right conception here. It is a moral awareness of ourselves. It's a moral awareness of ourselves before the face of God, definitely in relationship with God and others. Pardon me. So that when we are being subject or subordinated to the authorities, we are doing this because this is an outworking of our relationship with God together. It's not just about avoiding punishment, so to speak. That's one, you know, keep your nose clean, you won't get punished. Well, that's a good reason, I guess. But that's not the whole point. It's to live out this relationship with God and others together. Pardon me. You see in these verses and even verses three through five, sometimes again, we struggle with this and say, well, this seems like an awfully idealized portrait of authority, right? I mean, like really? Is every human authority doing God's will, serving the Lord, only punishing the good, and praising, exalting, I said that backwards, only punishing what is evil, and praising or exalting what is good? And you can say, well, I don't think that's the way it works in this sinful world. We've got a lot of problems. Pardon me. But what we need to be understanding is, yes, in a sense, in presenting an idealized portrait for us here, God is actually telling us how reality is supposed to work. This is what I've made this for. This is good, actually. And so, when you see the sin in this world, and you see the problems that come about, don't throw off the way God has made the world to work. Don't throw off God's good vision for his kingdom. Instead, press into it. Press into it more. Be more what God has called us to be as his people. Don't say, oh, the system's broken. Okay, I'm retreating to my little fortress and therefore I'm gonna defend myself against all comers and protect my liberties, let's say. Don't do that kind of a thing. That's not at all how we're going to act in keeping with what Jesus Christ is accomplished in this world. He plays this out a couple of ways The last couple of verses of this section, for the same reason, you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God. Pardon me, attending to this very thing. So pay your taxes, pay to all what is owed 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. Pardon me. This working on the mission, so to speak, is why you pay taxes. This is looking to God's good design for his world and honoring that and pressing into that and living in that together well. Now, there's so much we can say here, right, that we need to work on eventually. But for today's sake in the sermon and for time's sake, I wanna bring out one very, very important truth that this passage, I think just, this is the punch in the gut aspect of this passage. When it says be subject or subordinate yourself, and that Christians must get, if we think, oh yeah, we wanna live in a just world, okay, here's what you need to get. It's not about you. Die to yourself and your agenda and what you think you need and what you think you want and all the great things you think. It's not about me. As soon as we start defining our relationships with others, authorities, in fact, any of our neighbors about, it's about me. It's about my rights. It's about my freedoms and what I want. You're failing. You will not bring about a just society in that way. You can mark it down. You'll try. But it's always going to be a power contest. It's always going to be a battle. It's always about putting down those people that try to threaten me. Was that the way Jesus lived? Jesus, who came as King of kings and Lord of lords? What are we called to do? It's not about me. It's about the glory of God. It's about the advance of his His honor. It's about the good of my neighbor. That's what I'm really after. Why are you existing in this world? Why did God give you a house? Why did God give you a job? Why did God give you property? Why did God give you anything? For the good of your neighbor. That's why you have it. The whole point of you existing right now is to steward what God has given you to bless, to be giving. to be generous, to have God's grace and goodness and truth flowing through you to the world around us that desperately needs it, because they're all living that way like it is about them. And they think the world works this way, and it never works, right? We're that injection of life in the kingdom as God's people that begins to say to the world, guess what? Jesus has come, and he's raised from the dead, and there's a whole different way of living. that we can live in together by faith in Jesus Christ. And that, just to further this point, it makes me want to emphasize, this is going to be by faith. You're gonna live this way if you trust God. If you're like Peter on the wind and the waves and you start looking around at the storm that's going around you politically, socially, and culturally, and every other way, and you don't keep your eyes on Jesus, You're not gonna be able to live this way. You're gonna think this just isn't gonna work. It's through faith and patience that we inherit the promises. Is that not what scripture says? We trust God and his work in Christ. Pardon me. And we live in light of that coming kingdom. And we keep following and we keep trusting. We acknowledge that God is the sovereign. He really is ordering this world to accomplish His good purposes and we can trust Him for that, right? We don't have to try to be God. Again, we always do a bad job when we try to be God. We can trust Him through this. All authority comes from Him. That's the real reality. That's the way the world works. And we entrust ourselves to Him because we know He is working out good. through the way in all of his diverse ways, that he shines out his authority in this world. It's a powerful, deep calling that we have been called to, but this is how we pursue a just society. Subordinate yourselves. Now, again, there's much we can talk about here, but I want to show you the connection pardon me, with what the Apostle Paul goes on to say here in this very text. Oh, no one anything except to love each other. For the one who loves has fulfilled the law. He's just working this out even further. Working this out. What are we really pursuing when we're doing this, when we're subordinating ourselves to the authorities that exist? We are pursuing love. And that's the way the law will be fulfilled. That's the way we will actually carry out God's good instructions in our society. We have to love one another. Verse 10, love does no wrong to a neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law. Remember, Jesus himself told us that as followers of him, we are to love even our enemies. which means we exist in union together with them, a union of mutual indwelling, a union that says it's good that you exist and it's good that we exist together. I thank God that we exist here together. I want to press into this relationship. I want to develop this relationship. Pardon me. I want it to be actually good. And so when Human authorities fail, as they often do, in greater or lesser ways. What does love do? Love doesn't say, destroy them. They failed, they're worthless. It says, no, let's live in the truth together. Here's what's good, here's what's right. That's why, in a sense, authority in God's world is always a kind of a two-way street. Now, it's not symmetrical. We're not saying that we invert the order of authority or things like that, but it's always a mutual giving. As I said earlier, authority is a bearing witness to the truth. Those who are receiving this must respond in the same way, must give that And where that relationship starts to break down and not be about the truth, those who are under authority need to give the truth back. That's how we support authority. That's how we live in love together. That's why what sometimes the world calls disobedience is actually not disobedience at all. That's why I said at the beginning, we don't have to qualify this command. Be subordinate, always, period. And that means sometimes you will not do what an authority communicates when that authority is failing to communicate God's authority. But that doesn't mean you then say, oh, now I don't have to think about you anymore. Is that love? No, it's, no, I'm gonna press into, I want you to live in the truth. I wanna help you live in the truth. And we're gonna work on this together. And if you persecute me for living in the truth, which I'm doing for your sake, that's before God, but I'm gonna live in the truth, and I'm gonna help you live in the truth, and it's gonna be good together. And you know what we're showing the world? We're showing the world a way of living in a just society that they can't imagine, but really is true according to the kingdom of God. Pardon me. There's so much more we need to talk about. I'm trying to keep this from turning into a massive treatise on political theology. But I really think if we Christians will pursue these basic instructions that God is giving to us here, God can work. God will work. God will bring about his kingdom purposes in Jesus Christ. So let me today just simply exhort, brothers and sisters, do your part to make a just society. Be subject and love. And I really believe God will work through our witness to glorify his name. If you respond to this message in faith, in Jesus Christ, let's confess our faith together that Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord. Lord, we look to you now. Pardon me. As the one we trust, as the Lord of all, And we don't hold that to be simply our private religious truth. What just happens to be our opinion about the matter. We are holding, professing, proclaiming publicly today that Jesus is Lord of all. That angels, authorities, principalities, powers have been put under his feet. And that at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord to your glory. That's our desire, that's our delight. In fact, our delightful duty is to live in that reality right now. And by doing so, not to put ourselves in opposition to your good plan for your world, but actually to press into your good plan for the world. And we need your wisdom. Lord, we confess today so often we are so influenced by the world system around us, by our own ignorance, but we're not to have our hearts darkened like unbelievers. We are to have our hearts lightened, walking in the light as it is in Jesus Christ. We are to be filled with your spirit and therefore carrying out life in the spirit. Pardon me. Oh, give your people here today, Lord, the faith to believe you, to say this really is good to be subject, to subordinate myself, That's not a failure. That doesn't leave me as the doormat, so to speak, in this world, and I'm just gonna be walked over forever. The world system will win if we're just subject. No, actually, just like Jesus Christ saying, if I'm lifted up, pardon me, the ruler of this world is judged. And we want to live in that reality today. Give us the strength and the courage to do that because we know that sometimes it will produce suffering on our parts. We will have to suffer in order to live this way. But if we suffer for doing good, like your Apostle Peter told us, then we are blessed. This is actually a good thing. This is living in reality. This is living in Christ. This is being abundant and fruitful. In a world that's so disordered, Lord, so caught up in hatred and anger. We are here as your people to show the world a society built on love. I pray that you would enable us to do that. We confess before you we need your wisdom, the wisdom that is from above, that is pure, peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, reasonable. Lord, I pray that this kind of life would characterize us within the body, obviously, in our own households and families and all of our social and economic relationships. And then it would just pour out from us like a life-giving stream to the world around us, whether it's in our politics or our economics or whatever it might be. I pray that we would be showing the world a better way We need your grace for this, Lord. We need you to lead us by your spirit. We need your instructions. May we sharpen one another, encourage one another, enable one another, equip one another to live this way, seeking first your kingdom and your righteousness. Pardon me. Lord, may our living this way simply confound the powers that be. May they not be able to understand your church in a sense, like Pilate in front of Jesus was confounded. May we be able to speak to our authorities and call them to the authority of Jesus Christ, which they are ordered to, which whether they'll acknowledge it or not, they get their authority from. Pardon me. And show your triumph in our lives, Lord, as you work out your good plan in this world. We do trust you. We want to see your salvation. We look forward to your kingdom, and so we pray your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. In Jesus' name, amen.