The Role of Government - What Does the Bible Say?

Politicians have a lot to say about what they believe the role of government to be. Those on the left often want more government at the federal level, especially more public programs. They argue that this strategy will be able to help more habitancy because these programs are made ready to everyone across all of the states. To meet the funding imposed by such spending, they prefer an increased tax burden at the national level, again where it can be distributed among more people.

Those on the right ordinarily want most of the government to be at the state and local levels, retention both taxes and spending programs closer to the people. In this way, most of the tax revenues are spent locally, just as most of the projects are for the benefit of only those same people. They want a smaller federal government, with lower taxes and lower spending, that would focus on only a few projects at the national level, and few of which would comprise public programs.

The Bible

Few habitancy perceive that the Bible defines what the role of government should be. Our founding fathers built our republic upon biblical principles. Most Christians would agree that the ideal law would be one that bases its laws and policies upon God's laws. However, as our governing bodies have changed, have we strayed from God's ideals? Let's explore the purpose and scope of government, in single the federal government, from a perspective of the Bible and history.

The role of government is set forth in the Bible in 1 Timothy 2:1-2, which indicates that we should pray for everyone, together with "kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives." This tube tells us that, as Christians, we should pray for our leaders in government, and it also indicates what we should expect from our officials.

National Defense

The single most foremost role expensed to our government is to allow us citizens to live peaceful and quiet lives. In Genesis chapters 10 straight through 12, God divided habitancy into national entities. He condemned aggression among the nations, but knowing the greed and evil of man's sin nature, He established national defense as a means of safety against enemy aggressors. If our government is to enable us to live peaceful and quiet lives, its first responsibility is that of defense. Furthermore, since the body of government that most often interacts with other nations is our federal government, then this responsibility falls primarily to the federal level.

The Constitution

Since our government was built upon biblical principles, documents such as the Constitution support biblical guidelines. Its preamble limits the Power of the federal government to the following:

1. Ensure domestic tranquility - law and order

2. Furnish for the base defense - a national defense

3. Promote the normal welfare - biblical truths

4. Secure blessings of liberty - allege our freedom

In addition, the first three Articles of the Constitution continue to set forth its purpose of limiting the role of the federal government. This document doesn't emPower the government, by stating the things that it cannot do. Instead, it limits its power by stating a short list of things that it can do. If a positive thing is not in the list, then the government doesn't legally have the power to do it. Also, the Bill of rights explicitly names positive rights which the government cannot violate under any circumstances. The Tenth Amendment is particularly interesting, essentially stating that any powers not explicitly given to the federal government are reserved to the states or to the people. Clearly the intent was to limit its size and power.

An Evaluation

Our government seems to do a good job in fulfilling its tiny powers as set forth in the Bible and the Constitution. The federal level provides a strong military, and the state and local governments Furnish law and order. However, besides being inefficient and not well-managed, our federal government consistently oversteps the boundaries defined by the Constitution and the Bible. It has vast far beyond its proper role, always doing more than it's legally permitted to do, and consequently burdening all of us with taxes that are far too high. When our state and local governments consequent this pattern as well, the burden on the habitancy is overwhelming. This is positive when we consider the sheer size of our governmental bodies. It is estimated that our 90,000 government units (including cities, counties, etc.) hire some 20 million habitancy with a payroll of over 0 billion, together with some 0B for the payroll for the 3 million civilian employees at the federal level alone. Although these payrolls are only a small division of government spending, government employees do add much overhead to the tax burden.

Government Spending

We have immoderate government spending, which has led to immoderate taxation. The federal government spends several times as much on entitlement programs alone as on defense. Despite complaints from politicians who oppose the war in Iraq, the estimate we spend on the war is less than 10% of what we spend on entitlements. This encourages everyone to feel entitled, together with banks, assurance companies, automakers, and politicians. everyone expects a free monthly check.

Our government tries to do much more than what it was intended to do. It can't explicate spending money for every cause, just because someone will benefit from it. It is not the government's job to or re-distribute wealth. Politicians have distorted "promoting the normal welfare" to mean empowerment for the federal government to do approximately anyone as long as it's intended to help any excellent group or individual. Many Americans don't understand this, and some just look to the government for handouts. Politics seems to be a game, where everyone demands something from the government. We need to stop all of the undeserved entitlements, which are being funded by others.

The Church

While the government should be less involved in public programs, the Church should be more involved in alleviating the need for entitlements by providing more aid to the truly needy. Galatians 2:10 says the we should remember the poor. This should be the role of the Church, not the government. However, maybe our churches could best fulfil this role if its members weren't overtaxed.

Obeying the Government

Although our government is not perfect, Romans 13:1-7 says that we should respect it. As long as it isn't asking us to do something ungodly or immoral, we should commonly obey it. Even if we believe that our tax money is misused, we should still pay what we owe. However, if the government were to fail to allege our freedom, or to protect us from criminals, we are within the Bible's guidelines to object. If it attempted to directly impose an unjust or immoral law upon us, it would be not only our right, but our very Christian obligation to refuse to obey.

When the government attempts to impose unbiblical laws, we have several choices of action:

1) Vote - If we don't Charge at the ballot box, we have no right to complain.

2) Take any necessary legal action.

3) Flee - If government conditions come to be intolerable, we can take off ourselves from its jurisdiction.

4) Civil disobedience - Stand up to our adversaries straight through nonviolent refusal.

Why This Trend Continues

We have nobody to blame for these issues except ourselves. We elected these habitancy who are spending our money. A large part of the question is that we ourselves are caught up in the government's bureaucracy, and we selfishly protect our own interests in spite of what is right. However, I fear that we may have already passed the point of no return in our immoderate government spending, and it's only a matter of time until we face dire consequences.

My assessment is that the estimate of Americans (or households) collecting some form of an entitlement check every month has recently surpassed the estimate of us who receive no checks from the government. Does it make any sense that 45% of us are providing most of the funding for the other 55% of us? Not only are we already outnumbered, but we're still addition our entitlement programs and bailing out companies that have mismanaged their businesses. How do we expect to continue when an even smaller division of habitancy will be asked to fund a larger division in the future? How can we return to having a responsible government when over half of us are already dependent upon this one? When the government finally gets to the point of having too many habitancy dependent upon its entitlement programs, and too few to fund them, then that government will plainly collapse.

In truth, there are only a few specific responsibilities that a government should be empowered to do. It should protect us and keep us free to obey God's commandments and bring glory to Him. The government isn't supposed to do all for everyone. In fact, it's supposed to do very little. The voters share the blame for our current overspending. We are wrong if we don't vote, and if we selfishly vote the same big spenders into office for repeated terms, so that they will continue the entitlements. The Church should bear more of the burden for helping the truly poor and needy. In this way, these projects are funded straight through contributions rather than taxation.

---