This post is part of a series of posts taken from Dr. Wayne Grudem's
Sunday school class at Scottsdale Bible Church. In this class, Dr. Grudem is taking us through his forthcoming book: Politics: According to the Bible. I have created a category link here, which will allow you to scroll through all of the upcoming posts.
In this week's Sunday school class, Dr. Wayne Grudem made three political statements from his study of the scriptures:
- Governments should safeguard human liberty.
- Nations should value patriotism.
- When obedience to government is wrong.
Human Liberty
Grudem states that slavery and oppression are always viewed negatively in Scripture, while freedom is viewed positively. However, he does mention that certain liberties must be given up for the good of the society. Speed limits for example. "But", says Grudem, "each liberty given up slowly erodes our overall liberties". Wayne provided a humorous example of losing his liberty to use plastic grocery bags.
Patriotism
Certainly when the walls of Jericho came tumbling down, those involved felt a certain twinge of patriotism knowing that they were victorious, and were a part of God's chosen nation of Israel. Dr. Grudem provides many examples of Biblical patriotism, and points out seven benefits of patriotism to a nation.
Civil Disobedience
Clearly the Bible instructs us to obey our governments. "However", says Grudem, "Christians should not obey the government when obedience would mean disobeying a command of God". Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, when they refused to worhip the golden image, was once such example.
In the question and answer portion of this class, Dr. Grudem spent a few minutes discussing why he supported, and was an early signer of, The Manhattan Declaration.
Here is the audio from the class:
