Dale Partridge - January 16, 2025


Gospel and Government： A Theology of Authority


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33 minutes

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121.53273

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4,120

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230

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Summary

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In this episode, we begin a new chapter in the book of Romans 13, which I believe has significant application for a church who throughout church history have grappled with civil government. We begin with an introduction to the term "authority and rule" in Romans 13 and how it relates to the church, the state, and the family.

Transcript

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00:00:00.000 Amen. Well, what a blessing it is to continue Romans with you all. It'll be two and a half
00:00:10.820 years before we're done, but hey, we're here. And we begin a new chapter in the book of Romans.
00:00:17.920 Chapter 13, which I believe has significant application for a church who throughout church
00:00:25.880 history has grappled with civil government. We obviously experienced this even through 2020 and
00:00:32.180 2021. As Joseph mentioned and Corbyn taught last week, the Bible prescribes three spheres of
00:00:42.580 sovereignty. We know we have the family, we have the church, and we have the state. And the family,
00:00:53.040 the church and the state these are spheres of sovereignty that are all under a greater sphere
00:00:59.220 of sovereignty of god and what corbin mentioned is that each of these spheres overlap with one
00:01:08.760 another but the tendency is to either abdicate or exceed the authority given to each of those
00:01:20.640 spheres. So we want to have a proper balance of the church, the state, and the family. You know,
00:01:27.240 the church ought not to afflict capital punishment. The state ought not to determine doctrine
00:01:35.520 for the citizens. The family ought not to administer the sacraments. These are common 0.69
00:01:44.960 realities of where these cooperate and where
00:01:48.960 they are to be separated. Now you may be wondering
00:01:52.820 if you've been with us, how did we go from
00:01:56.860 the practical application of chapter 12, you know, the 30
00:02:00.820 marks of a true Christian, which was that
00:02:04.980 series there, to the topic of government.
00:02:09.400 What happened? How did we go from all this practical application
00:02:12.840 to now we're talking about the government? What is that transition in Romans? Now, if
00:02:18.840 you remember, chapters 8 through 11 are essentially a multi-dimensional defense of the sovereignty
00:02:26.780 of God, particularly in salvation, but also in the redemption of the world. Now, chapter
00:02:36.240 12 was a shift in the book of Romans. It was a shift from gospel belief to gospel behavior.
00:02:46.640 And so it was all about what we should do as a result of the gospel that we just learned about
00:02:53.340 in chapters 1 through 11. Now, if you recall, the last few verses of chapter 12 dealt with
00:03:03.380 the command of bless those who persecute you and to not return evil for evil, but to leave
00:03:12.960 vengeance to God. So with that context in mind, chapter 12 or sorry, chapter 13 explains how
00:03:23.140 God's vengeance is carried out. And it aims to give Christians peace that assures them that the
00:03:34.880 justices, the injustices that have been delivered to them will be dealt with through the authority
00:03:44.760 and rule that is under Christ. And we know that these ministers that God says are His in Romans
00:03:54.300 13 are ministers to punish evil and uphold righteousness. So the end of chapter 12 teaches
00:04:07.060 Christians to refrain from taking out personal vengeances or grievances. And chapter 13 0.76
00:04:15.540 clarifies how God's vengeance will be carried out through the authorities that he has established.
00:04:23.680 That is the transition mark, and that is where we are at. Now, one point I want you to catch
00:04:30.060 in chapter 13 is that it picks back up on this design of God being sovereign over everything.
00:04:39.020 And so chapter 12 was kind of practical application, but it shows again that God is not just sovereign
00:04:46.480 over salvation. He's sovereign over the world, the rulers, the governments of our society.
00:04:56.980 And so, Ephesians 1.22 says,
00:05:00.480 And God put all things under his feet.
00:05:06.120 You can just stop right there.
00:05:08.520 All things under his feet.
00:05:11.640 Then he uses a coordinating conjunction.
00:05:13.260 He says,
00:05:13.860 Christ is not just the head of the church.
00:05:23.760 He is the king of the world.
00:05:25.980 Now, we have to recognize that because we live in a generation that says,
00:05:29.840 oh, separation of church and state.
00:05:33.540 Jesus is only head of the church.
00:05:36.260 He's not head of the world.
00:05:38.480 Now, remember, separation of church and state is what we just talked about.
00:05:42.100 It's that the state should not be administering sacraments
00:05:46.100 and the church should not be afflicting capital punishment.
00:05:48.960 That is what was happening in England when the Puritans split off and came to the Americas.
00:05:55.980 And that is why our Constitution has a separation of church and state.
00:05:59.760 It's not a separation of God from state.
00:06:02.740 It's a separation of church from state.
00:06:04.980 The church is to disciple the state and the family, according to the Word of God.
00:06:13.500 And so, today, we're not going to actually get into verses 1 through 2.
00:06:19.980 That sounds like me, right?
00:06:21.320 We're still going to do an introduction of chapter 13 because I think that there are some important historical and theological context regarding authority that we need to understand.
00:06:38.160 And so the doctrine of Romans 13 revolves around really two Greek words.
00:06:45.080 Exousia, which means authority and power or rule, jurisdiction.
00:06:52.020 And then archon or archa, which means more specifically a ruler or magistrate.
00:07:00.160 So those two words are important.
00:07:01.880 If we don't understand the historical and theological context for authority and rule,
00:07:07.180 we're going to misinterpret chapter 13 and so we want to understand what this means
00:07:14.440 now under the old covenant the jews had been called out from among the nations okay they are
00:07:23.820 constantly being told to separate themselves from gentile or foreign authority and rule
00:07:32.480 Deuteronomy 7 1 through 4 talks about you know the Lord gives you land and he clears out the
00:07:41.220 nations before you Leviticus 20 talks about you shall inherit the land and I will give it to you 0.98
00:07:46.060 to possess the land of flowing milk and honey I am the Lord who has separated you from the peoples
00:07:50.800 okay so we see this kind of separation of 0.98
00:07:57.900 God's people from foreign authority. That is the Old Testament witness to this particular
00:08:06.660 conversation. You know, 2 Kings, Hosea's rejection of Assyrian overlordship, Mordecai's refusal to
00:08:14.220 bow down to Haman, Jehoiakim rebels against Babylon rule, Daniel's disobedience to King
00:08:22.540 Darius, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego's disobedience to Nebuchadnezzar. I mean, it's
00:08:28.740 just constant in the Old Testament. Rejection of foreign authority and rule was like an old
00:08:37.600 covenant ethic. It's what they did. It's actually even still a mark of Jewish culture today. 1.00
00:08:45.100 So when Paul in Romans 13 calls for a universal submission to the ruling authorities, and those authorities are sovereignly ruled by God, you begin to see how like a persecuted Christian or especially a Jewish Christian, like a Jew just came to Christ, would have concerns with that.
00:09:11.820 It's like they might be wondering, how did we go from it's good for God's people to reject foreign authorities and rule to submit to these governments because they all come from God. 0.51
00:09:27.100 That's a huge leap for a Jewish person.
00:09:30.800 That's a huge leap even for a persecuted Christian.
00:09:33.120 and as we wrapped up the Christmas season just a few weeks ago I want to share with you a verse
00:09:43.820 that we all read together that answers this particular question Isaiah 9 6 through 7 it
00:09:53.460 says for to us a child is born to us a son is given and the government shall be upon his
00:10:03.100 And his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
00:10:09.660 Of the increase of his government and of peace, there will be no end.
00:10:16.300 Okay, so this is speaking to a new rule and reign of a new king.
00:10:24.460 So, more context theologically here.
00:10:27.560 before jesus adam was given authority to rule over the earth
00:10:35.900 but this authority was lost due to sin and the temptation of the enemy and as a result
00:10:44.320 satan temporarily became the ruler of this fallen world
00:10:50.840 we know matthew chapter 4 verses 8 through 9 it says the devil took jesus to a very high mountain
00:10:59.280 and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and he said to him all these i will
00:11:07.600 give to you if you will fall down and worship me in other words the devil had some degree of
00:11:14.780 authority and rule to make such an offer to Jesus. Okay, but we know that Christ takes that authority
00:11:22.960 without bowing down to Satan. Jesus in John 12, 30 through 31 says,
00:11:30.420 now is the judgment of this world. Now will the ruler of this world be cast out.
00:11:38.000 And when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself. 0.76
00:11:44.680 Now, all people means peoples, not just Jews, all nations.
00:11:50.200 So then after Christ's resurrection, and right before his ascension,
00:11:57.580 we know that he offered the great commission.
00:12:00.520 that says all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth go therefore and make
00:12:12.740 disciples of all the nations baptizing them in the name of the father and the son and the holy
00:12:19.100 spirit teaching them to obey all that i have commanded you and lo i am with you always even
00:12:27.380 to the end of the age. So, forensically or judicially or legally, this is what happened.
00:12:37.800 Okay, Jesus is, according to Romans 5, the second Adam. Okay, and he obeyed the law of God by keeping
00:12:46.740 the covenant of works that Adam failed to keep in the garden. And as we know, again from Romans 5,
00:12:54.140 Adam sinned, brought death to himself and to all that he represented.
00:12:59.480 It's why we all die, because we're all born of Adam.
00:13:02.360 It's why we all need to be born again in Christ,
00:13:05.720 so that we might have eternal life.
00:13:08.440 In other words, through the cross, and pay attention here,
00:13:11.980 through the cross, Jesus defeated sin and death. 0.51
00:13:17.420 He reclaimed the authority that was lost by Adam
00:13:24.140 And when it was usurped by Satan, Jesus is now fulfilling, this is key, follow along with me.
00:13:32.540 Jesus is now fulfilling the dominion mandate that Adam failed to accomplish.
00:13:40.880 That is, he is being fruitful and multiplying and filling the earth and taking dominion over all creation.
00:13:51.420 That was the dominion mandate given to Adam.
00:13:54.140 In which he failed.
00:13:57.080 He is replicating death.
00:14:01.140 Jesus is fulfilling the dominion mandate, but he is replicating life. 0.58
00:14:07.400 And so one of the great reasons that I'm post-millennial is that I believe the resurrection of Christ will outperform the fallenness of Adam.
00:14:16.600 Very simple.
00:14:17.620 Now, another reason I want to talk about is, well, I'll make an important clarification first.
00:14:35.960 When Adam fell and Satan usurped the authority from him, he took authority over the earth.
00:14:44.800 he did not usurp God's authority over all creation okay so that's a misunderstanding there
00:14:52.360 God has always been sovereign over Adam and over Satan and Jesus simply restored the authority
00:15:02.920 that had been taken in Adam's fall he reclaimed that authority judicially paying for the
00:15:11.600 consequences covenantally, death on the cross. And he was exalted as a result and given all
00:15:20.440 authority in heaven and on earth. So we know Colossians 2, I'm going to read it to you here.
00:15:24.780 It says, for in him, all the fullness of deity dwells bodily. And in him, you have been made
00:15:34.920 complete. Pay attention right here. And he is the head over all rule and authority. He disarmed the
00:15:43.740 rulers and authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them in him. Philippians 2,
00:15:53.760 9 through 11 says, therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that
00:16:00.060 above every name. So that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and
00:16:09.440 under the earth. And every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the
00:16:16.300 Father. Amen. Now, it's important to notice in these two passages of scripture that I just read,
00:16:23.420 there is past tense, present and past tense clauses here. And so God has highly exalted
00:16:33.480 Christ and he is the head over all rule and authority. And he disarmed, past tense,
00:16:39.880 the rulers and authorities and all authority has been given to him. And why is that important?
00:16:46.140 because christ's earthly kingdom is not something we're waiting for it's something that's being
00:16:54.280 built right now and it's being built through the gospel by the proclamation and work of the church
00:17:04.740 which is the body of christ so the head is jesus we are the body and we are accomplishing the work
00:17:14.980 of the head in the world. And so, again, I often say this, there is no paradigm in scripture where
00:17:23.080 the church can lose and the head can win. We rise and fall together because we are one with Christ.
00:17:30.600 And so if the body loses, the head loses too. That can't happen because all authority has
00:17:37.900 been given to Christ in heaven and on earth. He, the gates of hell, will not prevail against
00:17:42.920 the church. And so the question of how did we go from it's good for God's people to reject foreign 0.99
00:17:52.220 authorities and rulers to submit to all these authorities and rulers because they all come
00:17:58.660 from God. It's because Christ has now retaken, he's reclaimed the worldly authority of Satan
00:18:09.140 who usurped it from Adam, and the second Adam has now taken it back
00:18:16.600 and is now the supreme king of kings, where all authority has been given to him by God.
00:18:24.400 Now, another clarification.
00:18:27.600 Christ's current rule does not mean that Satan has been already eliminated.
00:18:33.580 According to scripture, Satan has been bound, or he's been limited, but not eliminated.
00:18:43.160 So Satan still holds an influence over his old kingdom, particularly over unbelievers.
00:18:52.920 But he has lost the authority of a few things.
00:18:57.720 He has lost the authority to control those in Christ.
00:19:01.120 He has lost the ability to accuse Christians before God.
00:19:09.080 He has lost the ability to keep the nations in spiritual darkness.
00:19:16.240 Now, in Matthew 12, 29, Jesus explains, you might remember this,
00:19:21.600 they tell him that, oh, this man has to have a demon.
00:19:24.800 He's like, how could I have a demon?
00:19:27.740 That would be like Satan working against himself.
00:19:31.120 You know, would demons be casting out demons?
00:19:34.880 You know, a house divided against itself cannot stand.
00:19:38.180 Jesus explains his ability to essentially why and how he's casting out demons.
00:19:43.300 Not because he's demon possessed, but because he has overcome the ruler of the demons.
00:19:50.140 And he's now, according to this passage, plundering that ruler's house.
00:19:56.500 He says, quote,
00:19:57.680 how can someone enter a strong man's house? He's talking to these people that are accusing him.
00:20:04.800 The strong man in this metaphor here is the devil. How can someone enter a strong man's house
00:20:11.780 and plunder his goods unless he first binds the strong man? Then indeed he may plunder his house.
00:20:23.500 Okay, so Jesus in the gospel binds Satan.
00:20:28.360 He binds him.
00:20:29.760 And now Jesus, through the gospel, is plundering Satan's kingdom.
00:20:35.900 He's plundering his house.
00:20:38.140 Now this plundering happens through the proclamation of the gospel.
00:20:41.120 You know, what the gospel is, is that it's God converting his enemies into his people.
00:20:46.520 And so, as more individuals are rescued from Satan's influence and brought under the reign of Christ, we are seeing Christ's authority and rule start to transform the world.
00:21:04.340 And that's what we're seeing in history.
00:21:06.200 And so as more of the devil's influence is diminished and Christ's kingdom through the gospel expands and Satan's authority in the world is reduced, this is the core of optimistic eschatology. 0.55
00:21:25.420 Do you think now that there is 3 billion Christians on earth, that there is less influence of the enemy or more influence? 0.56
00:21:38.200 Well, of course there's less.
00:21:40.420 There's 3 billion, 36% of the earth is now worshiping Christ.
00:21:48.800 Sure, are all those converted? Probably not.
00:21:50.660 But we know that Christ's kingdom is continuously and progressively growing since the very beginning of time.
00:22:01.940 This is the whole parable of the mustard seed.
00:22:06.360 That Jesus' kingdom is like a mustard seed.
00:22:09.080 It starts out small, but then it becomes the biggest kingdom of the kingdoms.
00:22:14.780 It's like, as Jesus says, leaven.
00:22:17.880 That leavens the entire lump.
00:22:20.660 And so, this process of incremental and ongoing victory through the millennia
00:22:30.100 is unfolding before our eyes as the church expands in the world. 0.85
00:22:38.960 And so, when Corbyn said that he expects Prescott to be a Christianized town, 0.98
00:22:44.940 yeah, we should all. 1.00
00:22:47.800 Now, when is that going to happen?
00:22:48.940 It might be 600 years from today.
00:22:52.140 But what we can know is that the gospel cannot fail because Christ cannot fail.
00:23:01.160 Because how does someone fail who has all authority in heaven and on earth
00:23:07.120 and has promised that the gates of hell cannot prevail against the church?
00:23:12.800 You can't fail. 0.96
00:23:14.560 Jesus already won.
00:23:15.940 All he's doing now is taking back the world incrementally through the generations by the proclamation of the gospel, generation by generation.
00:23:28.400 And as we've seen, the church, has it gotten bigger or smaller?
00:23:33.440 There has never been a point in history where the church has gotten smaller than the century before it.
00:23:40.600 It's always expanded.
00:23:42.420 so there was what a couple thousand in jesus's day then all of a sudden what happened we took
00:23:52.600 the we took rome the roman empire was christianized within 300 years
00:24:01.180 there were more christians
00:24:03.380 by the year 1000
00:24:09.060 than there was the population of the earth
00:24:12.180 when Jesus was there.
00:24:15.000 And so we are now continuing to grow.
00:24:17.860 So we look in the West and we're like,
00:24:19.760 oh, it's getting smaller.
00:24:20.820 It's not getting smaller.
00:24:22.420 Maybe in the West in particular,
00:24:24.760 but have you heard what's going on in India?
00:24:27.200 Do you know what's going on in South America?
00:24:29.860 Do you understand what's happening in the Middle East?
00:24:33.380 Christ is growing his body all over the world and we can trust that the kingdom will only expand.
00:24:44.800 And so we now understand that this shift from rejecting authority and rule to submitting to it is grounded in the reality
00:24:54.100 that Christ has now reclaimed the authority that Satan stole from the first Adam.
00:25:01.940 The second Adam is now doing what the first Adam failed to do.
00:25:07.780 Isn't that wonderful?
00:25:09.860 Just the optimism.
00:25:12.660 We live in a totally pessimistic church.
00:25:16.340 That's like, you know what?
00:25:17.360 Hey, man, it's going to hell in a handbasket.
00:25:18.940 Let's just check out and wait.
00:25:20.020 In fact, you know what?
00:25:20.680 Let's just let it get worse quick.
00:25:22.860 Because the worse it gets, that means that Jesus is going to come back sooner, right?
00:25:26.840 You know, we turn evangelism into this kind of invitation to come to the losing team. 0.79
00:25:30.780 Hey, come become a Christian and be the victim.
00:25:34.440 That is not how anybody in church history thought.
00:25:38.620 I often bring up the reality of church cathedrals.
00:25:44.280 It takes 500 years historically to build a cathedral.
00:25:48.140 500 years.
00:25:50.460 The average cathedral.
00:25:52.480 Think about the kind of mindset you have to have to start building a cathedral.
00:25:58.780 Do you really believe that Jesus is coming back maybe in the next hundred years?
00:26:03.560 No way.
00:26:05.180 No, you are having a long-term view.
00:26:08.780 In fact, I had somebody comment to me on X this morning saying,
00:26:15.880 oh, we don't need all these empty buildings everywhere.
00:26:19.540 You know, it's all about the heart.
00:26:22.160 You know, we need Jesus in the heart.
00:26:23.840 The buildings don't matter.
00:26:24.740 We are the church.
00:26:25.540 You don't need to go to church.
00:26:26.560 And I reminded him in a comment that when you understand that Christ is building his kingdom, not just spiritually, but actually physically.
00:26:39.180 Now, he will come and restore it all and make it all perfect when he comes in his final coming.
00:26:45.000 But you realize that architecture is one way to manifest dominion in a town.
00:26:53.060 And if any of you have been to Salt Lake City, you'll understand this. 0.95
00:26:56.420 You go to Salt Lake City and you quickly realize this town is Mormon. 0.86
00:27:02.540 It's Mormon.
00:27:04.420 And so architecture communicates. 0.85
00:27:06.140 You want to go to a town, you want to go to the Middle East,
00:27:08.040 and you're going to see mosques. 0.99
00:27:10.480 And you're going to go, this town has a dominion of Islam is here. 0.98
00:27:17.180 And so we want church bells. 1.00
00:27:19.480 We want church buildings.
00:27:21.580 We want steeples and crosses.
00:27:23.960 We want those things to cover this town because it communicates something to anyone that comes into our nation.
00:27:30.740 Anyone that visits this town is Christ.
00:27:34.740 And so this is why it's so important for us to stop building terribly ugly buildings as churches.
00:27:41.060 Because I always think it's so frustrating that we have these buildings that are not reflective of the gospel that they preach.
00:27:49.540 we have this incredibly beautiful gospel and this extremely like depressing structure
00:27:58.060 again church history never did this even like the founding fathers of america and
00:28:03.740 just go to the east coast and you'll see beautiful historic church buildings
00:28:08.720 today we we take an old 7-eleven and turn it into a church it's it's like it doesn't matter
00:28:16.120 what the building looks like because it matters only about your heart. No. Yes, it matters
00:28:21.100 the heart. Sure. That's important. In fact, I will take people that are filled with the
00:28:26.200 heart, with the Holy Spirit in an ugly building than a giant building where nobody's actually
00:28:32.100 saved all day long. But I'm saying is that it's not this or it's both. Okay. You know,
00:28:39.520 we don't serve filet mignon on paper plates for a reason, right? It doesn't match the
00:28:43.020 beauty of the meal. And so we should be building these church buildings
00:28:46.520 that are like depressing cinder block buildings.
00:28:52.060 We should be trying to match the beauty of
00:28:55.120 the gospel that's preached within it. Because
00:28:57.760 architecture communicates. What do you do when you come to Prescott?
00:29:02.840 You go to downtown. Why? Oh, because there's a beautiful
00:29:07.180 building there. So we go
00:29:09.740 downtown in fact probably a million people a year come to this town and visit downtown
00:29:17.920 courthouse square and we essentially in a way worship with our presence a state building
00:29:26.360 okay imagine if we were europe for a second and you had a cathedral in this town a beautiful
00:29:34.860 cathedral where you had actual believers worshiping in there and you had people instead of coming to
00:29:42.820 look at this courthouse building which really isn't even that beautiful if you've been anywhere
00:29:47.920 else besides Prescott but you start to see the impact that architecture can have on society
00:29:56.440 and so that's just one dimension one dimension that I'm talking about here
00:30:02.260 and so we will see in the coming weeks how Romans 13 is this authority that Christ has
00:30:14.080 that he is now taken back and he extends that authority by sovereignly appointing rulers
00:30:22.720 and governments and kings and we've all seen just recently the appointment and protection
00:30:30.560 of kings like Trump and the turning of a head
00:30:34.200 that saved a nation, a quarter inch
00:30:37.120 that kept this nation from falling into a completely different cycle.
00:30:43.640 And so we can see God's sovereignty
00:30:47.040 as he uses his authority to fulfill his purpose in the world.
00:30:52.920 so christians are called to submit to the governing authorities
00:31:01.240 not because they're perfect but because they are instruments
00:31:07.280 in the hands of the king who is sovereignly working all things together for his glory and
00:31:13.640 history so when we read next week every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities
00:31:22.800 for there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God.
00:31:30.300 We now have a little bit of that context of what governing authorities are,
00:31:37.260 what authority is, what rulers are according to Scripture.
00:31:42.980 And so we're going to start working verses 1 through 2 next week,
00:31:46.760 And I think it'll help us grasp the robust reality of Paul's teaching and not just the reign of authority, but the limits of authority.
00:31:59.520 And yes, it'll be primarily civil authority, but we're going to see also how the authority of a father, of a pastor, of a parent, of maybe some other sort of position, a teacher, all of this authority stems from God if it is used according to God's law.
00:32:27.940 Amen?
00:32:28.700 Amen.
00:32:29.380 Let's pray.
00:32:31.640 Father, we thank you, Lord, for the beautiful grasp of authority.
00:32:41.780 Lord, we thank you that your son Jesus has retaken and reclaimed the authority.
00:32:47.400 And that he is conquering victoriously over Satan and his kingdom that has fallen.
00:32:54.040 and father we ask that you would bless each of us to understand deeply the rich robust nature
00:33:01.760 of the gospel and that your authority would extend not just into the civil sphere but into our homes
00:33:09.240 into our churches that a clean biblical authority would rule in this nation and across the world
00:33:16.960 we thank you in jesus name amen amen
00:33:24.040 Thank you.