Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received, freely give. Mat 10:8

“Wisdom and truth, the offspring of the sky, are immortal; while cunning and deception, the meteors of the earth, after glittering for a moment, must pass away.”

"The jawbone of an ass is just as dangerous a weapon today as in Samson's time."

If you have followed this far (I am impressed!) you may have noticed that I have studiously avoided answering a blindingly obvious question – if authority is from God, for the authorities that exist have been established by God, where does satan get his authority from?
If it is from God, and three times Jesus describes satan as ‘the prince of this world’, then doesn’t that imply that his authority is also good?

This is critical if we are to coax from hiding the further questions that are peering from behind the skirts of this one. In his letter to the Romans, Paul goes on from the Scripture above to warn us, Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. Are we supposed to submit to the Hitlers and Stalins too? Always? And if not always, at what point does rebellion become ‘godly resistance’? And if so, what does that resistance look like in practice?

Studying false authority in Scripture will give us some clues, and reveal another key principle in understanding how authority works. We will attempt to tackle the others in later chapters, when we look at the application of correct authority in society and government.

The Bible speaks a lot about false authority. First of all of course is satan himself. Then there are false prophets, apostles, Christs and other, self-appointed, ‘authorities’. And finally the Scriptures are full of examples of bad kings, religious and secular rulers, who lead unholy lives and oppose the work of God, or who simply fail to rule. There is plenty of ‘false authority’ out there, as many of us have had occasion to experience!