Originally posted by Obsidian
View Post
Were the Babylonians more righteous than the Jews and therefore punished the Jews because they took offense at their sinful behaviour. No, it was God who took offense at the sinful behaviour and used the Babylonians to punish the Jews. In Babylonian minds they attacked the Jews for other reasons.
Why was Israel under Roman occupation at the time of Jesus? Surely because God allowed them for His purposes. Does this mean Caesar and Romans were better than the Jews? No, God was dealing with the Jews and their leaders were corrupt and the vulnerable being oppressed. That Romans were also corrupt and oppressed vulnerable people is not the issue. God was dealing with Israel.
So basically the reason I looked to "Jews from the distant past" was to try understand why people like Paul should say we should obey secular leaders who are apparently "not a terror to good works but to evil" when clearly these guys were/are often full of corruption and sinfulness themselves. Faithful and repentant Jews were still in exile in Babylon because they were judged as a nation and exile didn't physically stop the moment they repented. As Christians we are not physically in the New Jerusalem or with Jesus yet so in a sense this is again similar to those faithful Jews in Babylon who had to wait for God to bring them back. Secular leaders are therefore not a terror to good behaviour in that the only time they are justified in punishing us is when we deserve it (either individually or nationally) and our consciences will agree with it.
So basically the Jews in Babylon were waiting to go back to Jerusalem. Christians are waiting to go to the New Jerusalem. The Jews were exiled by God fom Jerusalem and this is how they came to be in Babylon. We were physically exiled from God in Adam and that is why we as Christians can find ourselves in a world ruled by secular leaders who do not always act on God's authority. These leaders are not a terror to us because as long as we are in Christ we are no longer under condemnation and nothing should terror us.
Comment