Today, I am reading and commenting on  Romans 11-14.

My title for today’s blog highlights what strikes me as a needed reminder for Christians today and I will discuss its implications.  But first there are a few other important points I want to touch on.  Chapter eleven explains why one cannot be a faithful follower of Jesus while harboring hate against the Jewish people.  In fact, we should pray that they come to salvation and, in the meantime, lovingly engage with them.  Paul tells us that we have been blessed because of their rejection of Christ, but that we will be doubly blessed when they turn to Him.  In chapter twelve Paul tells us not to conform to the patterns of this world.  We must strive to avoid allowing the world around us to shape the way we think about people and issues.  We must not allow the world around us to shape our thinking.  Instead we should seek the transformation of our minds which the Holy Spirit is constantly implementing.  We can recognize the transformation inspired by the Holy Spirit by the way it encourages us to humbly value others above our own desires.  This will lead us to resist the efforts of the world to cause us to lump individuals into groups where we stop viewing the worth of the individual, only valuing them as a member of whichever groups they are a part.

Which brings me to what Paul writes in chapter thirteen.  He tells us that we should submit to the governing authorities because they have been established by God, that no one holds the authority of government unless God gave it to them.  Ultimately those who wield the levers of power do so only because God has chosen for them to do so.  Despite the fact that some leaders are chosen by the election of the people and some leaders are chosen by military might, all of them serve at the pleasure and will of God.  So, those who were worried during this recent election that the wrong people would end up governing us, their worries were in vain.  Those who are governing us, and those who will be governing us, have that authority because it was given to them by God.

I am not going to write about chapter fourteen, but I humbly ask that you read it for yourself and think about what it means for you.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.