Acts of the apostles: R.E.S.P.E.C.T.

There are moments in Scripture when something seemingly small opens the door to a deep spiritual truth. Acts 23:1–5, the text for today, provides us with one of those moments. In today’s passage, Paul is standing before the Sanhedrin, the very council that once empowered him to persecute Christians and is now on trial for his faith in Jesus Christ. What unfolds is not merely a courtroom exchange, but a deeply pastoral moment which was a lesson in conscience, authority, and the holy restraint of a sanctified heart.

This brief incident confronts us with a truth we often resist in the area of respect and especially for authority, which is not rooted in the character of the leader, but in the character of God. The issue is not whether a leader is righteous, but whether we will submit ourselves to God's revealed will—even when it's uncomfortable, unfair, or undeserved.

Acts 23:1–5

Paul opens his defense not with a strategic argument but with a moral declaration. He appeals to the conscience—a theme that runs through his letters found in…

Romans 9:1
With Christ as my witness, I speak with utter truthfulness. My conscience and the Holy Spirit confirm it.

1 Corinthians 4:4
My conscience is clear, but that doesn’t prove I’m right. It is the Lord himself who will examine me and decide.

2 Timothy 1:3
Timothy, I thank God for you—the God I serve with a clear conscience, just as my ancestors did. Night and day I constantly remember you in my prayers.

To Paul, the conscience is not a vague inner voice, but it is enlightened and formed by the Word of God and the presence of the Holy Spirit.

His statement, “before God”, indicates that he is not performing for the crowd. His conscience is not focused on public opinion or religious tradition but by God Himself. This is crucial: Paul stands confidently before men because he has stood humbly before God.
True respect, whether for others or oneself, flows from a heart that knows it is fully committed and accountable to God. The integrity of a believer’s conscience is not measured by the absence of conflict with others, but by an alignment with God’s will.

The Blow of Injustice
No sooner had Paul spoken these words than the high priest responded with violence.
This action was illegal under Jewish law, which required a formal process before punishment. Striking a man who had not yet been proven guilty was not justice; it was cruelty. Ananias, known in historical records for his greed and cruelty, represented the worst kind of religious hypocrisy. He bore the title of “high priest,” but his heart was far from God.
The strike to the face was both physical and symbolic. It represented an attempt to silence the truth and maintain religious control. And Paul responds with righteous anger.

A Just Rebuke, a Humble Retraction
Paul exposes the hypocrisy of the high priest, someone who pretended to uphold the Law while breaking it. The term “whitewashed wall” recalls Jesus’ own words in Matthew 23, when He described the Pharisees as tombs painted clean on the outside but full of decay within.
Paul is not cursing Ananias but pronouncing judgment in line with prophetic tradition. The words are reminiscent of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, who confronted corrupt leaders with uncompromising truth.

Paul doesn’t justify himself. He doesn’t explain his reaction or double down. He appeals instead to Scripture, specifically Exodus 22:28, which says, “You must not dishonor God or curse any of your rulers.” He bows not to the man, but to the Word of God. This is a crucial distinction. Paul’s deference is not to Ananias personally, but to the position God had ordained.

In doing so, Paul models for us a theology of authority that is deeply countercultural: the office matters, even when the person occupying it fails.

Respect and the Bible
Romans 13:1–7
When Paul wrote to the Romans, he wasn’t addressing believers living under a Christian government or a friendly political system. It was quite the opposite. The Roman Empire was often hostile, sometimes violently so, toward the church. And yet, Paul opens Romans 13 with this stunning statement:

“Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.” (Romans 13:1)

This is no small command. Paul isn’t speaking as a man detached from persecution; he writes as one who has been unjustly beaten, imprisoned, and slandered. And still, he holds fast to the truth that authority, even flawed and fallen authority, is rooted in the sovereign plan of God.
Here, we benefit from the clear thinking of theologian John Stott, who writes in his commentary of Romans:

“What Paul writes is specially remarkable when we recall that at that time of this writing there were no Christian authorities (global, regional or local). On the contrary, they were Roman or Jewish, and were therefore largely unfriendly and even hostile to the church. Yet Paul regarded them as having been established by God.”

This conviction is rooted in biblical tradition. Paul inherited a theology from the Old Testament that proclaimed Yahweh as “sovereign over human kingdoms and gives them to anyone he wishes” (Daniel 4:17). As Proverbs says, “By me kings reign and rulers issue decrees that are just” (Proverbs 8:15).

That does not mean that every ruler is good, or that every government act is just. Far from it. Stott continues:

“We need to be cautious, however, in our interpretation of Paul’s statements. He cannot be taken to mean that all the Hitlers and Stalins of our times were personally appointed by God, that God is responsible for their behavior, or that their authority is in no circumstances to be resisted.”

There is a tension here. Paul affirms the authority structure, but not every use of that authority. Jesus Himself said to Pilate, “You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above” (John 19:11). That did not excuse Pilate’s actions, but it framed them within the mystery of divine sovereignty.

As Stott concludes:
“The principle is clear. We are to submit right up to the point where obedience to the state would entail disobedience to God. But if the state commands what God forbids, or forbids what God commands, then our plain Christian duty is to resist, not to submit, to disobey the state in order to obey God. As Peter and the other apostles put it to the Sanhedrin: ‘We must obey God rather than men!’”

Respect Is Not Conditional
One of the most challenging aspects of biblical ethics is that respect is not earned—it is commanded.

Modern culture trains us to equate respect with approval. If someone is kind, competent, or likeable, we show them respect. If they fail or offend us, we withdraw it. But God’s Word doesn’t give us that option.

Peter writes in 1 Peter 2:17: “Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor.”

This wasn’t a hypothetical command—it was written during the reign of Nero, one of the most brutal emperors in history. And yet, Peter calls believers to honor him, not because Nero deserved it, but because God is worthy of obedience.

Showing respect to unjust leaders does not mean we excuse their sins. It means we refuse to sin in our response. It means we uphold the dignity of our calling as Christ’s ambassadors, even in the face of unrighteous power.

Is It Ok to Resist Authority?
N.T. Wright asks the questions in his book Jesus and the Powers, “So, is disobedience to government possible for the Christian? The answer is ‘yes’, for two reasons. First, no earthly institution, whether monarch or magistrate, possesses absolute authority. The authority of the State is not an inviolable position but a performance of service, a service rendered to God and exercised for the people. The government’s authority is, then, conditional upon its performance to meet God’s standards of righteousness and to win the consensus of the people in how they wish to be governed. Second, while government is divinely instituted for the common good, and should be obeyed in principle, not every governor is good. Government should not be obeyed in every instance, especially if it interferes with religious liberty, acts unlawfully, or renders harm to its own people.”[1]

Jesus: The Model of Meekness and Majesty
All this points us to Christ. Jesus stood before Pilate and did not revile him. He was struck, spat upon, and mocked—yet did not return insult for insult.

Isaiah 53 tells us, “He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth.”
In His silence, Jesus demonstrated strength. In his submission, He triumphed over the rulers and authorities. And He calls us to walk in His steps, not because we are weak, but because our strength lies in God.

Paul, the former persecutor turned apostle, understood this. He was zealous for truth, but also formed by grace. And in this moment before the Sanhedrin, we see a glimpse of what spiritual maturity looks like: a man quick to correct others, and just as quick to correct himself in the light of God’s Word.

Conclusion
We live in an era when public discourse is characterized by outrage, mockery, and division. Authority is often despised. Leaders are regularly ridiculed. And Christians can be swept into the current of outrage just as easily as anyone else.

But as followers of Christ, we are not called to mirror the culture; we are called to model Christ. The world may celebrate rebellion, mock authority, and prize personal autonomy above accountability, but a different standard shapes the people of God. Our identity is not formed by the trends of the age but by the truth of the cross.

Christ did not come to assert His rights but to surrender them. He humbled Himself, even to the point of death on a cross (Philippians 2:8). And He now calls us to walk in that same spirit of humility, submission, and reverent obedience—not because we trust in human leaders, but because we trust in the God who raises up and brings down (Daniel 2:21).
So, we must ask ourselves some hard questions:

• When you speak about leaders, do your words reflect the heart of Christ?
  Do you speak truth with love, or do you echo the anger of the culture? Are your criticisms clothed in prayer, or merely vented in frustration? Paul instructed Timothy to lead the church in offering “supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings…for kings and all who are in high positions”. It’s easy to protest. It's far more Christlike to pray, and even more Christlike to pray for those we struggle to respect.
  
  
• When you disagree with your pastor or spiritual leaders, do you do so with grace and humility?
  We are not called to blind allegiance to any man, but we are called to respect those whom God has placed in spiritual oversight. Hebrews 13:17 exhorts us to “obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls.” Disagreement is not a sin. Even in correction, we are called to gentleness, remembering that leadership is a sacred trust and that tearing it down recklessly can grieve the Spirit and harm the body.
  
  
• When you suffer injustice, do you trust God enough to submit your will and your response to His Word?
  There is a difference between righteous resistance and fleshly retaliation. Jesus suffered injustice silently, entrusting Himself to “Him who judges justly” (1 Peter 2:23). Paul appealed to his Roman citizenship not to avoid suffering, but to bear witness in the right way. The call to suffer well is perhaps the most significant test of submission, not to man, but to God.

This moment in history doesn’t just demand louder voices. We need a revival not merely of passion but of reverence. Reverence for God, reverence for His Word, and reverence for the structures of authority He has ordained.

We must recover the truth that respect is not weakness. It is a sign that the old self has been crucified with Christ, and that we now live—not for ourselves—but for Him who died and rose again on our behalf (2 Corinthians 5:15). It shows the watching world that our allegiance is not to worldly power, but to the King of kings.

When we live this way, we proclaim the gospel—not just with our lips, but with our lives. We demonstrate that God’s authority is real, His Word is sufficient, and His grace is powerful enough to shape even the way we respond to those we struggle to understand or obey.
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Let the church be known not just for what we are against, but for the quiet dignity with which we honor others, the bold humility with which we speak truth, and the faithful respect with which we reflect the character of Christ in a disrespectful world.


[1] Michael F. Bird and N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Powers: Christian Political Witness in an Age of Totalitarian Terror and Dysfunctional Democracies (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2024), 111–112.

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