The grand doctrine, on which the leading principles thus expounded in the standards of our church proceed, is that which is adverted to by the apostles, while vindicating their resistance to civil authority, at the 31st verse of the passage of Scripture before us—the doctrine, namely, embodied in these words, “Him hath God exalted with his right hand to be a Prince.” That Jesus of Nazareth, whom the chief priests and rulers of Judea had slain and hanged on a tree was now seated at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens—all power, both in earth and heaven had been given to him—and having, in the exercise of that sovereign power, called the apostles and their successors in the ministry of the gospel to bear rule in his church, and to feed that flock which he had purchased with his own blood, no earthly ruler could interfere with them in the discharge of those functions which are proper and peculiar to their sacred office, without incurring the sin and danger, as Gamaliel expressed it, “of fighting against God.”
The Christian life is represented as pleasantness and peace, productive of present enjoyment, and leading to future and eternal blessedness. In every condition of life, the pious Christian has consolations and sources of happiness which the world knows not of, and of which it cannot deprive him; and in the depths of affliction, he has the cheering hope of a glorious immortality. Yet ought it not to be forgotten, that the Scripture exhibits the Christian to our view, as a soldier engaged in an arduous conflict, which needs steady perseverance, and which requires all the excitements to courage and fidelity which the Gospel supplies.
This is the expression, you observe, not only of sincere love to the law, but of ardent love to the law. It is an appeal to God about an ardent love to the law: “O how love I thy law.” I would, entreating the presence and guidance of the Holy Spirit, think for a little with you on the grounds why the psalmist and why the saints do love God’s law, do love God’s law so ardently. Why do they love? Now, all that is rightly moral is founded on the fitness of things; therefore this love, as moral—as indeed it is the sum of all morality—is founded on the amiableness of the law. Love to the law is proper, and right, and fitting, just because the law is amiable. But let us inquire a little deeper into those circumstances about the law on which the amiableness of the law is grounded.
What has befallen the Jews, since they rejected Jesus of Nazareth, is that which will happen to all despisers of the gospel. What is to happen to Israel in the latter days, when they shall repent of their unbelief and embrace the true Messiah, is the same which every repenting sinner will experience at the hands of a merciful God. Here is the description of that grace which God will show to such sincere penitents—“They shall serve the LORD their God, and David their king, whom I will raise up unto them.”
There is much contemporary confusion about the proper attitude of subjects to lawful authorities. The Apostle says (Rom. 13:1-2), “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers, for there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.” Some have interpreted this apostolic command to imply unconditional obedience to magistrates. Others note that subjects may lawfully resist the exercise of tyrannical power, and that the Biblical doctrine of resistance to tyranny has a long pedigree.
