In our continuing discussion of, the book, "When to Disobey,” we are joined by Toby Logston a pastor of one of the churches in our network in Lynwood Washington. We are discussing chapter 5, “Honoring Authority Over Us.” Viret makes a very strong case for honoring authorities. He bases this on the fifth commandment, telling us that the application is much broader than simply father and mother. We live in a time when very few people were brought up to honor their fathers and mothers, and therefore they don’t honor anyone.

Well, welcome to the Church and Family Life podcast. Church and Family Life is dedicated to the communication of the sufficiency of Scripture for church and family life. And we're here to discuss a chapter out of this book, when to disobey articles by Pierre Verre, case studies in tyranny, insurrection, and obedience to God. And in order to have this discussion, of course, we have my friend, Jason Doe, pastor of Sovereign Redeemer Community Church here in the area. Hey, Jason.

Hi, Scott. Got another interesting chapter before us. Yeah. And guess what? We have Toby Logsdon of New Beginnings Church in Linwood, Washington.

Toby, hey, good to see you. Hey, Scott, thanks for having me on today. I'm excited to talk about the subject with you. Yeah, So let's do it. So we're in chapter five of this book where Viré uses the fifth commandment to explain a critical principle for understanding how to relate to the civil magistrate, and he takes off of honor your father and mother which is the first commandment of the promise and he uses a discussion format in this chapter of a conversation between two individuals Daniel who is the teacher and Timothy who's the learner And they're discussing this principle.

It's really a principle that Vire, the reformers, the Puritans after them, the successors of the Puritans like Charles Spurgeon and others who believe that the Fifth Commandment applied far more broadly than just to parents, but it actually applied to the civil government. And he's making a really strong case for honoring authorities using this commandment. And you know, it's interesting that we have this chapter before us. We live in a time where there's such a rebellion, there's such a bad attitude, such a really dishonor toward civil magistrates. Civil magistrates sometimes say, do, and think the craziest things, and often the response of the church is to slam back at them and be dishonorable, you know?

And we want them to honor us, but we're not going to honor them. So it's a difficult time because civil magistrates often do things that are not honorable and so we dishonor them and so in our behavior I think we have to keep this in mind and and of course he deals with unjust treatment in the light of the Fifth Commandment. And so let's talk about that. You know, you have unjust treatment, you have, you know, wrong, unprofitable, unbiblical ideas that civil magistrates hold. Let's just talk about the application of this commandment to those kinds of situations.

Well, I think that starts with just an understanding that he points out immediately that Scripture gives us the answers. And if we're looking to anything else other than God's word for how to respond to a civil magistrate, you know, if we're looking at some worldly philosophy and saying, you know, Is this a helpful analytical tool or anything like that? No, Verri makes it very clear that scripture is sufficient. He says, God didn't give his people an imperfect law in which he admitted anything suitable to such a lawgiver as he is, as well as to the people over whom he has willed to be lawgiver. To the contrary, he's given a perfect law which encompasses and contains all that concerns his glory and the good for mankind.

So that's where it has to start. That's where that whole conversation has to start, I think. And you know, he's pretty brutal to those who would dishonor authorities. He calls them more savage than wild beasts, okay? And that we are just nothing but unruly savage beasts, unable to be contained.

And then he says, well, actually, savage beasts are better because they actually can be trained, but when people become dishonorable, they're savage. Yeah. It's an interesting chapter. It's different in structure, I think, than any other chapter in the book, because he puts it in the dialogue between a teacher and a student, between Daniel and Timothy. And he starts out with the fifth commandment, honor your father and your mother, but then he does expand it to teachers, masters, we would call those bosses, the civil magistrate.

And I think we have a great warrant for doing that. This is exactly what Jesus does in Matthew chapter 5. He starts with a series of, you have heard that it was said, but I say to you, and he actually expands the law. So what we find in human nature is we're always trying to whittle away the law and make it small and manageable, but actually there's a heart behind each one of the laws that is quite expansive and includes our thoughts and our words as well as our deeds. And so, Verre is, I think, really picking up on that and taking this commandment.

So, he starts with the parent-child relationship, but then he goes way beyond that. But I wanted to read a quote from page 61 where he talks about the parent-child relationship and he says, human nature is so corrupt and perverse that it can't align itself to the obedience of the Word of God or submit itself to any discipline at all. Therefore, it's also necessary for us to have our fathers who have the authority and power not only to teach and correct by words, admonitions, exhortations, and rebukes, but who also carry the rod in their hand to chase and embody and goods the rebellious who don't heed the teaching of God." So he's really talking about the home and a father specifically as kind of the training grounds for future relationship to authority. And so, God puts every human into a family structure where the Father actually has very expansive authority, and has been given the rod to enforce it so that we're learning as we grow up because we have natures that are bent against it. We're learning to be able to submit to authority.

Right, he talks about how disastrous it is not to be able not to learn that in your home, right? Because it carries with you throughout your life and he he talks about the just the damage That is done By the dishonorable person. So maybe we could talk about that a little bit. He just talks about what happens in the world when you have, you know, dishonor. You know, it's interesting because We live in a time when self-esteem in children is viewed as the greatest good, you know, building up their self-esteem.

And it's been taken in many circles to such an extreme that there is no more emphasis on discipline. In fact, discipline by fathers is frowned upon by much of society. So there again, there's that bent will away from God's design for humanity and for what's best for us really. And he even has esteem for ungodly governors. And he says, if there were no such corrections of the civil magistrate, he says, the world would not have any safety if there weren't at least parameters even of wicked civil governments.

And of course he broadens it out to pastors, to bosses, to all manner of authorities that are given to us. He talks about, you know, those who are apprentices and those who are under their authority, and he's really making the case that authority is something God puts everywhere, And you need to learn it at home, or you're not going to exercise it anywhere else. Right. There's something fascinating that he does. Verre on page 65 interjects a thought that I've never had, I've never read, or encountered anywhere else, but he talks about the structure of Romans.

Of course, Romans 13 is what most of the book is about, how a Christian should relate with various authorities, and especially the civil magistrate. But he backs up a bit, he backs up a couple of paragraphs into the latter part of Romans 12, which is about love. Let love be without hypocrisy. And then Paul says a lot of things that instruct us on love. And then we have the uninspired chapter break, meaning Paul didn't put the 13 there, we did, and he's immediately talking about government.

And he says, he's essentially making the argument that love is the basis for good submission to government. Of course, that makes sense with what the New Testament teaches that the law is, our laws of love, that love is the fulfillment of the law. Here's a quote from page 65. He says, by this we're taught that if love doesn't govern us, we will never fulfill our duty towards our superiors as we ought." I just thought it was just a really helpful thought. Yeah.

Yeah, that is so good. And he gives examples here. Maybe we could talk about some of the examples that he gives. He talks about the prophets, he talks about all kinds of others that would be called authorities, and the impact that, the good impact that they had, you know, on the people. He makes it really clear that man needs to be governed.

And He, you know, he quotes Aristotle, Aristotle who called governors guardians of the law. And you know, Aristotle was not talking about Christian governors. So there's this great principle of law keeping that's really, really critical. So he speaks about this matter of, you know, 1st Peter 2, let every soul be subject to the higher powers. He calls us to honor the king, And he goes through various passages of Scripture.

He even talks about honoring those who are older than you. He quotes Leviticus 19.32, You shall rise up before the hoary head and honor the face of the old man and fear God. So he doesn't leave any authority untouched in this whole manner, and he sees God's people as just living under authority, never getting out from under authority. People think that they can get out from under authority. They are sorely mistaken.

It never happens. And so being reconciled to those authorities is what, that's the case that he's really making. It made me think a lot about my responsibility of a father just in being diligent about establishing this in a good, healthy way in our home and how it really does set the patterns for how the children who are growing up in our homes are going to relate to authorities the rest of their lives. They're gonna have other teachers, they're gonna have church leaders, they're going to have bosses in the workplace, and they're gonna be living under city governments, county governments, state governments, national governments, and all of this. The way they relate with those authorities is being learned right now.

You know, He says that when you reject the authority of the civil government, you're effectively abolishing all other authorities. He uses really severe language to talk about this. He does. And this is actually a subject that I think a lot of people today would do well to explore in an age when we're talking about defunding the police and when in a lot of our cities we've done that. That's who he's talking about.

And I think the statistic I saw today was that in Portland, ever since they started the defund the police, you know, that whole thing, homicide has gone up 800%. Whoa. Yeah. So, the idea of abolishing civil authority is disastrous. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Right before our eyes, we're seeing it all over the country. Yeah. Here's something interesting in the chapter.

He spends a lot of time and space in the chapter talking about our natural inclination to kick against the goads. In other words, there's something in us that doesn't want anyone to be the boss of me. So, he takes this up on page 66, but He says something wonderful, which is that God has chosen the name Father. So here's a quote from that page. He says, God knowing this pride of heart and haughtiness of spirit employed the most natural, gentlest, pleasantest, and least disagreeable names and titles of superiority of any that exist among men." And so he's essentially arguing that God is aware of our inclination to kick against the goads and he actually is communicating even by the name that he's chosen for himself as father, that he intends good by setting up structure.

It goes way beyond who gets to be the boss. Authorities exist for the good of the people who are placed under them and authority. And what God does is He puts a father in a family to help his children every day while they're growing up to learn how to honor, and how critical that is. Fathers that neglect to teach their children to honor, they're really sinning against their children. And what he says, I'll just quote him, he says, we mustn't expect any good from such a person, the person who's not been taught to honor, No matter what position he might ever be in, for whoever has never learned to obey will also never know how to rule well to command justly." I mean, it just heightens the importance of the role of a father to tenderly and strongly deal with dishonor and his children.

He's got to do it. It will commit them to a terrible end if he doesn't do it. And every father knows that you have to do it every day. You know? Right.

Right. The father who doesn't do it every day finds that his inconsistency comes back in a negative way. Yeah. Yeah, that's so true. So Scott, you're just making the point that Verre lays out the case that, you know, children not learning to submit to authority in their home are set up for destruction.

But he makes the argument of the opposite, too. The children who do learn to submit to authority in their home. He says they're suitable for any office. In other words, having learned to be under authority, they have learned actually to be in authority, to be good authorities later in life. No, that is so good.

And you know, this is the command with the promise. Right. It goes well with the children who obey their parents and honor them. We have such a duty to secure that. And boy, how hard hard it is.

But yeah, he continues to make all kinds of cases for this. He talks about the one who curses his father or his mother in Exodus 2, verse 17, And they ought to be put to death. He talks about, you know, the stubborn, rebellious son in Deuteronomy 21, who gets so bad that eventually the whole community lifts up stones. He's so harmful, you know, that it didn't work with his parents and it didn't work in the civil realm. And so finally all of them gather together and they put him away.

It's just a tragic picture. But that son or that person in Deuteronomy 21 didn't learn it at home. Mm-hmm. And he kept escalating up through life. And then finally, the people in the culture didn't want him around because he was so harmful.

He talks about ingratitude as a sign of lack of honor. So there you have it. I mean you have this very strong appeal to honor and that it affects absolutely every area of your life. And I think we should take this and I think we have to talk about our homes. We have to think about whether we're being faithful to secure honor relentlessly with our children and just not letting things go.

On the other hand, we have to guard our own hearts. You know, when you have a civil magistrate that misbehaves like the ones that are around us now, we tend to want to react with dishonor. And we might even in front of our children dishonor authorities by speaking evil of them, using evil terms, things like that. You know, when you have messed up authorities, you know, the comedy industry really expands. But sometimes, you know, parents go overboard and they don't honor authorities.

You know, I was thinking about the different people that have been arrested in Canada recently and how did they respond to the authorities? Did they respond honorably? My view is some responded honorably and some didn't. But, you know, we have a duty to respond as to a father if we're arrested or mistreated in any way. And you see that, I mean, you see that in the martyrs, the way that they treated their captors, they treated them wonderfully.

And there's so many examples, particularly in the Scottish Reformation and the Protestant Reformation. Going back to Perpetua and Polycarp, they were so kind to their captors that their captors just begged them, please, because they loved them on the way to their execution. So let's just talk about that, honoring those who dishonor the church. Well, there's the indication at the end of Philippians that the guard to whom Paul was chained had actually become a Christian. He'd actually been converted.

He had to endure Paul's joy. I mean, that book is all about the joy that Paul had, even in the midst of his circumstances. And there's an indication there at the end of chapter four of Philippians that it's possible that his guard was converted through his testimony. And if Paul had, say he'd taken the rebellious, defiant, in-your-face kind of approach, what does that do to the flesh nature of the unregenerate man, it just fires it up. Whereas Paul being joyful and gentle and gracious and honoring to this guard.

I think would have had a very positive effect. Would have at least said, you know, he would have said, I'm willing to listen to whatever you have to say. But That's one place to start, to start looking at that from a biblical perspective. Yeah. Pete Yeah.

And in an earlier chapter, Vireh says, the wicked actually want you to misbehave. David Right. Pete They want more reasons to condemn you. So, they say things and do things to set you off. David Right.

Pete I think we should realize that too. We're being set up in a way, but let's not take the bait. Makes me think of David and how he responded to Saul even when Saul was pursuing him to take his life. It's a remarkable example of honoring the dishonorable. Yeah.

Other examples in Scripture that you can think of where you see this kind of honor? Daniel. Daniel's, yeah, comes to mind for sure. All over the place in that book, yeah. Yeah, the apostle Paul did the same thing.

He appealed graciously. He didn't go down swinging. Well, when Peter wanted to go down swinging, when Jesus was arrested, Jesus put the sword back and healed the ear that had been slashed off of the servant of the high priest. So we have a master that really calls us to a completely different response. We don't strike back in the same way.

We honor the authorities that are there even when they really, really misbehave. I just thought this was such a helpful chapter. He acknowledges the corruption of the authorities. He acknowledges the tendency that we have to strike back, but he pulls us back to the Word of God and teaches us really fundamental things that start in the home. Yeah, he makes a point that is really probably made in every chapter, which is that all authority really is derived from God.

It's delegated authority. So when children are learning to honor their parents, they're actually learning to honor God. Paul makes that explicit. Any final comments here with the time that's left? You know, history gives us so much to think about and knowing that for the last 250 years in America, it's really been a very unusual situation where the church and the state have been at peace.

We have to go outside of that 250 years in North America to really get just a volume, a huge volume of writings and history in terms of the tension that has historically existed between the church and the state. And that's where you find people who have struggled with scripture and see how they dealt with it. Amen. So here we are, you know, we're in America where we're really still very, very free. And we're talking about, you know, how important it is to honor the authorities.

You know, we're sitting back here in our air conditioned spaces and our comfortable chairs and the police are not waiting outside, you know. And so it's easy for us to talk about these things right now. What do we need? We need to continue to fill our hearts with the Word of God, to continue to prepare us, to strengthen us, to honor those who are in authority, and then to teach a whole other generation to do the same, and to teach our churches to do the same, and to have the fifth commandment before us so that it might go well with us. So I pray that happens.

Amen. Brothers, thank you so much. Appreciate the time. Well, thank you for joining us on the Church and Family Life podcast. Hope to see you next time.

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