Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s.
This government (Caesar) gives us not only the responsibility of paying taxes like the Roman government did, but it also demands vigilance. That is the responsibility of Christians as well as any other group - to be vigilant so that absolute power does not corrupt people already challenged by a fallen human nature (as all of us are).
This form of government is a gift from God. As with all His gifts, He wants us to cherish and protect it - and not use it for toilet paper instead.
I agreed with you that the primary task of a Christian is to spread the Law and Gospel to bring salvation to people. Part of that is tending the soil that is being trampled by lies and corruption. We also have the tasks of serving in our vocations, in our families, in our communities, and in our nation - all of which are a gift and all of which are avenues for us to be people of truth. Sometimes the only way people know to trust what we might tell them about the Bible is because they have seen that we are faithful and truthful in our vocation, or in our family, or in our nation. He who is faithful in a little will be faithful in a lot.
When God provides opportunities, we speak the Word of salvation.
All other times we live the truth wherever God has planted us. And right now, He’s got me in an America that desperately needs truth and the rule of law. Rendering unto Caesar what is Caesar’s means diligence; that is my vocation as a Christian in America right now. It is not keeping me from speaking the Word of salvation when the opportunities arise.
I never want to be so Heavenly-minded that I’m no earthly good. Heaven is where I belong; it’s what I long for with all my heart and where I want everyone to be with me. But I’m deployed to America right now, and He has me here for a reason.
I don’t have any problem in being a good citizen and participating fully in our Constitutional Republic. I say to everyone, take part in your civic responsibility and do what one should do as a citizen. That part is perfectly fine with me. It’s actually more than just fine, I figure it’s really mandatory as a citizen.
What I am not going to do, though, is connect up the Gospel message of Salvation with any particular party, with any government, with any piece of legislation, with any President, with the US Constitution, with the Declaration of Independence or anything of a political nature.
In fact, when the one-world government of the Messiah of Israel is set up by him (in the near future) with him ruling and reigning over all the nations of the world — every one of the Bill of Rights will be CANCELED and the entire US Constitution will be null and void! And the Messiah of Israel’s one-world government will be 100 times better than our Constitutional Republic. Our Constitutional Republic, the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution are absolute trash, when compared to the righteous and perfect government of the Messiah of Israel.
But, that’s not really an issue for us now, because right now we have been given by the Founding Fathers the best secular and man-made government that we could possibly have. And that’s the reality that we live in right now.
So we do our duty as responsible citizens for what we have in a secular government. But we don’t mix up the Gospel message of Salvation offered to each person individually with anything with the present secular government that we have. If one does that, or attempts to do that, with the salvation message for mankind, it corrupts what is perfect and holy with the profane and secular of a man-made government.
And just so it’s clear from this other angle, too ... I’m all for including in a man-made government the long-standing principles and traditions of Western Judeo-Christian society, from which we’ve arrived at this present point in time after hundreds of years. But, in no way, shape or manner does God or the Bible mandate a particular kind or form of government or a kind of political party we should have or participate in.
This government is NOT mandated by God and God is not saying that you should have “this or that” in a political party or in a Constitution. You only have individuals who are Christian who may carry forth some of their principles of life (which they may have personally carried forth from their personal faith), into the public sphere by way of conscience and personal motivation.
In the end God will TOTALLY DESTROY this present form of government as EVIL and as OF THE DEVIL, and replace it and all the other governments in the world with his perfect, righteous and holy governmental THEOCRACY, ruled by the Messiah of Israel with a “rod of iron”!