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God's Servants

             This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their full time to governing. Give to everyone what you owe them: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor. (Romans 13:6-7)

Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it. (Hebrews 13:2)

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. (Preamble to the Declaration of Independence)

This isn’t one of my favorite passages. I don’t consider myself good at most “people things,” and honor and respect are people things. I find it difficult to use honorifics. I’ll gladly refer to Mr. Trump, but struggle with President Trump. It has nothing to do with the sort of job he’s doing, because it was Mr. Biden and Mr. Obama, too. I think those who refer to them by just their last names (Trump, Biden, Obama) as rude, though I admit, I tend to think in terms of Lincoln, Washington, Hitler, and MLK. If Pastors are called “Pastor,” it’s because it’s become part of his first name, or perhaps his whole first name.

Other folks don’t have it any better. I spend a great deal of my life among nameless people – and I’m not talking about strangers I pass on the street. I can spend years working with people for whom I have no name other than (for example) the name of their department. When I first started spending winters in Florida, I made a habit of praying for my neighbors. If they had a name sign out, I  prayed by name. I could tell you who lived in many of the units, but if I saw the owners in a group with others, or saw them outside the park, I couldn’t tell you their names. Maybe this isn’t unusual, but I notice it in myself.

The point, however, is that I don’t “people” well. It doesn’t help that I have the American attitude mentioned in the quote from the preamble of the Declaration of Independence. Or that I’ve worked with people in authority and know that they are not necessarily any more intelligent, wise, educated, moral, good, etc. than anyone else. On the other hand, I tend to hold some folks who would be described as “nobodies” in comparatively high honor because they have either demonstrated expertise or good character.

 But, we have today’s passage, and the one from Hebrews, both of which tell us that our honor, respect, etc., should be given whether or not we agree with or like the authority or not. God referred to people we could consider tyrants, monsters, or world-class jerks as “My servant.” And this is an area in which I need work – even just to be more aware of people as people.

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