Page:The Net of Faith.pdf/565



The second reason for Paul's words is this: (:Everything is to be done orderly and peacefully. The authorities have sometimes the same aim. And the Christians should help them in this, all the more considering that this is what God requires of them. Men of faith do good without waiting to be compelled to it by laws. Also, there are many who, being liberated through the grace of God from the burden of the old law, interpret this freedom as unchecked liberty, giving them a free hand to rebel against their overlords.:)

This thought of ten moves, even today, good and bad people who, greatly desiring freedom, think of how to humiliate and unseat their lords so that these will not override them. Therefore, Saint Peter, seeing this, calls this freedom a pretext for evil, which wrongly obstructs true freedom.

Desiring the freedom of Christ much too physically, they object to being subjected to higher powers which, however, enslave them as guilty, depriving them even of that little freedom of conscience and body they had. 1-Pet. 2:16.

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