OBEY THE LAW May 26, 2020

Romans chapter 7 indeed was written by the apostle Paul to a civilized audience.  The text for today’s devotional rightly pointed out how one must align the mindset to the spirit and letter of the law (which incidentally, were two of my former law professor’s favourite words) if one must live by the law, and yet have the freedom to live beyond it.

I was reminded of a local journalist’s column, which cited some memorable words from Cebuana actress Kim Chiu.  He said that Kim said that the basic rule of life (during this pandemic, most especially) is to obey the law.  And that means, like, if in school the teacher says do not go out of the classroom, then one must obey.  Otherwise, there would be dire consequences.

I wonder how many of us find it difficult to follow simple rules and norms of good manners and right conduct.  One foreign friend long ago mentioned that the Philippines masquerades as a democracy, but is actually an anarchy—people just do what they want regardless of the consequences.  We throw our trash everywhere; we sell our votes and elect corrupt politicians who grow more and more corrupt; we idolize good-looking yet less-educated celebrities then vote them into office for them to continue the cycle of corruption; people do not study hard enough and just cater to the dictates of their reproductive hormones thereby creating more and more babies, and yet when faced with tragedies, cry out and protest against the government for not doing enough; people do not want to toil for honest labour and seek shortcuts to wealth, sacrificing hard earned money to bet on the lottery; people do not want to take care of the land, abandon the farms, and live informally under the bridges, on the sidewalks, on abandoned lots and buildings in the urban areas, thereby being first in the line of casualties during floods, typhoons and epidemics.   The list was long, insulting yet true. 

No wonder then that the police have apprehended so many violators to the quarantine rules. It’s because as a people, we are not really obedient to the laws of the land.  How much more the laws of GOD as stated in His Word?

But then again, like what the apostle Paul and my former teacher said, the spirit of the law is to help us live a free, healthy, safe, happy and well-ordered life.  The thrill of lawbreaking is only for juveniles who are ignorant of what great future lies ahead of them.  It shouldn’t be the case for us now, which was one of Asia’s earliest and longest democracies.

Maybe the downtime during the pandemic should be a time for us to reflect deeply how we are as a people.  Our doctors and health experts are saying we need to seriously change our health and hygiene habits.  And we believe them, because we believe these are words from modern day heroes.  But I’m willing to guess we wouldn’t be so obedient once the new normal passes.  Although our leaders wouldn’t dare mention it because once they do, so many bright minds from so many prestigious institutions would scream foul, saying it is an infringement to human rights, freedom of expression, it’s unconstitutional etc., but I dare say this—we need to seriously start obeying the law, whether ordinances, resolutions, codes or guidelines. 

If we want to be legal about it, at least study the first chapters of the Constitution, and realize that it doesn’t talk only of rights. It also talks about obligations, that is, our obedience to its letters. 

As professing Christians however, I dare leave this verse: “Don’t you know brothers, (for I speak to those who know the law), how that the law has dominion over a person as long as he lives?” (Romans 7:1)

Therefore, we can only justifiably disobey or disregard the law once we are dead. However, if we want to live a little longer, just OBEY THE LAW.

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