Civil Disobedience

This is not something
the Founding Fathers would have worn.

Therefore whoever resists the authority resists the ordinance of God, and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. (Romans 13:2)

It isn't wrong for Christians to engage in civil disobedience. That isn't what Paul is saying to the Romans.

If we aren't we should be doing so. We should be worshipping in defiance of gathering restrictions and masking mandates because these things are paving the way for further violations of our religious liberties.

We should obey God rather than men. 

At the beginning of the pandemic, it made sense to follow the government's recommendations. No one knew what we were actually dealing with and there wasn't any data to go by. After the BLM riots in June 2020, however, circumstances changed. When government officials encouraged the riots because systemic racism in American society was a bigger concern than COVID-19, the proverbial cat was let out of the bag. All of a sudden the governing authorities were not worried about mass gatherings of people without masks and social distancing. They weren't worried about super-spreader events.

That's because the pandemic restrictions were much more about controlling our thoughts, words, and deeds than they were about public health.

Before you point to Romans 13 and Paul's words about submitting to the governing authorities, remember that the Roman Empire in which Paul found himself and the United States of America aren't the same, regardless of what the Marxist history professors say. At the very least, they shouldn't be held up as a 1:1 comparison.

Our government isn't like the government of the Roman Empire. In our system, the people are the governing authorities. It's even written down in the Constitution. Our elected officials are supposed to protect the civil liberties which God has given mankind. When they fail to do this, the people have the right under the Constitution to alter or abolish that government. Usually, we do this by holding elections. Sometimes other actions are necessary.

The issue is that American Christians are looking for a type of persecution that is unlikely to come, and we're ignoring the creeping persecution which actually threatens us. We are waiting for jack-booted thugs to come to our doors and order us to turn over our Bibles at the point of a gun.

But the kind of persecution we are dealing with isn't harsh and violent yet. It's soft and bureaucratic.

Our governing authorities won't directly say "stop worshipping", not yet. Instead, they will progressively change conditions in society by passing laws that paint Christian beliefs and morality as fringe and racist. They will use the media to propagandize the masses into right-think, as they have done so successfully over the past decades until it becomes impossible to worship openly.

Mask mandates are a part of this process.

And, if we keep allowing this type of soft tyranny, it won't be long before the hard tyranny is knocking on our doors, figuratively and literally.

And before I'm reminded for the 56th time today, I know George Washington mandated smallpox vaccinations in the Continental Army. This is not the same situation as that was. 

Mask mandates should be defied because they don't stop transmission of COVID-19, and no thinking person actually thinks that they are protected while wearing a mask. What they actually do is create divisions between people. They make people suspicious of each other, and keep them separated. They make Christians hesitate when it is time to gather around word and sacrament. It is more than an inconvenience. They stifle worship.

Also, this disease is not smallpox.

Another part of Romans 13 that we also shouldn't forget about, however, is the part about the governing authorities bearing the sword for a purpose. If we engage in civil disobedience we need to be prepared to accept the consequences of our actions. The legitimate governing authorities may legally punish us for breaking the law. And, if they do, we must submit to that punishment including, segregation, ridicule, persecution, arrest, prosecution, imprisonment, and if it comes to it, death.

I'm not saying that we should volunteer to be thrown to the lions in the coliseum over compelled mask-wearing. Pushing back against an unjust mask mandate is relatively easy, though. If these circumstances are allowed to stand without opposition, things will only get worse. The next infringement will be more difficult to stand against.

If we aren't willing to push back now, we are less likely to do it when the stakes are higher. ###