Paul goes into this as well in Romans 13
The fact is that governance, stemming from the political man, is a part of Natural Law & Human nature
So to be governed is necessary.
But as Augustine hints at there is the City of Man and the City of God… this is how we separate and rectify this teaching.
City of Man is temporal … its laws and dictums will eventually cease… but the more higher power is of the City of God… and these are eternal, therefore greater.
Perhaps you may be coming from a western, democratic perspective with a notion for rebellion…
Truth is, in Christianity, in the time of the Romans, the state of slavery did not justify rebellion … The slave was to rely fully on God’s promises … kind of in the way of a martyr…
So the systems in place do not actually RULE us, as our spiritual livelihoods are reliant on Jesus and His graces.
Jesus tells Pilot… My Kingdom is not of this world, otherwise my people would rebel.
It’s a paradox… One can be a slave even though slavery is counter to Natural Law, one can be a Roman citizen even though the law is at the core from a no good power.
So, we are to have confidence in God’s Law no matter in which scenario we find ourselves in this world… One could be Christian in North Korea and Saudi Arabia… even though much of their laws prevent one from being a Christian…
Which opens up the question… Was the Am Revolution a just cause in the eyes of the Lord? I think one can make a strong case that it was not… If you read church reactions to liberalism in the 19th century, i think you’d see the church was highly skeptical of liberalism
… Let’s put it this way as well… We are to honor our father and mother… what if our father and mother are non-religious, and maybe very immoral… does that alleviate the 4th commandment… NO, it does not… there remains in place a relationship a Christian is to honor… Why? Because God made us their child, just as God made us within a certain political authority…
We must respect God’s wishes, if he made us the child of a certain parent, and born under a certain authority… we can assume we are suppose at least respect who we are as God’s creation, a father and mother’s child, and as a citizen of a certain authority…
Anything contrary is a statement of denying oneself… denying God’s plan for us as the child of a particular parent, or a person of a particular place
That being, we can still see the evils of slavery, we can still see the spiritual ruin of one’s immoral parents or immoral governance
