The envelope was handed to Jummai after the second service, in the small office behind the church where the pastor received visitors. It was a plain white envelope, unsealed. Inside was a single sheet of paper with fourteen names typed on it, each with a phone number and the name of a secondary school.
“These are our children,” the pastor said warmly. “Good children. Hard-working. Their parents are faithful members of this church. Some of them are in your choir.” He smiled. “God has placed you in that office for such a time as this.”
Jummai was a deputy director at the state scholarship board. Every year the board awarded three hundred undergraduate bursaries to students from across the state’s local government areas. The criteria were published: examination results, an assessment of family need, and a fixed allocation for each local government so that no part of the state was left out. This year Jummai chaired the shortlisting committee. More than four thousand applications had come in.
She knew several of the families on the list. One of the boys had sung in the youth choir since he was eight. One of the girls had lost her father the year before. These were not strangers. They were her church family, and many of them genuinely needed help.
She also knew what the list was asking. If she moved those fourteen names up, fourteen other students would move down. Some of them would be from her own local government, some from the far end of the state, some from Muslim families, some from churches she had never heard of. Many would have better results. Their parents would never know why their children had been passed over. They would simply live with the consequences.
That evening, her deputy at the board, a Muslim man who had worked beside her for six years, called to discuss the committee schedule. Before he rang off, he said something almost in passing. “You know, everyone in this office knows you are a Christian. You are the one who prays before meetings.” He laughed. “We are all watching to see how you will handle the pressure this year.”
PunchlineJummai put the phone down and sat for a long time with the white envelope on the table in front of her.
Decisions others must live with
Public office is a particular kind of trust. The person who holds it makes decisions whose consequences fall mostly on other people. A permanent secretary’s choice determines whether a road is built. A magistrate’s ruling decides whether a family keeps its land. A police officer’s conduct at a checkpoint shapes whether a traveller reaches home in peace. A scholarship officer’s shortlist decides which young people go to university.
Paul wrote to believers in Rome about the purpose of governing authority:
For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake. For for this cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God’s ministers, attending continually upon this very thing. Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due ; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour.
The passage is often read only as an instruction to citizens, telling them to obey and pay their taxes, and it is that. But look at how Paul describes the person in authority. Twice he calls him “the minister of God.” The word is diakonos, the same word used for a servant, a deacon, one who serves at table. In verse 6 Paul uses another word, leitourgos, which was used of public servants and also of those who served in worship. The person in authority is God’s servant, “to thee for good.”
That phrase defines the purpose of the office. Authority exists for the good of the people under it. It restrains evil and protects those who do right. It collects taxes, and Paul insists those taxes should be paid, because the authorities are “attending continually upon this very thing.” The office is a service rendered on behalf of others.
Paul is describing what governing authority is for. He is not claiming that every ruler fulfils that purpose. Paul himself was imprisoned and eventually executed by Roman authorities. The apostles, when ordered to stop preaching, answered, “We ought to obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29). But the purpose of authority is the standard by which every officeholder is measured, and for the believer who holds office, it is a description of the job God has given him. You are there as a servant, for the good of the people.
What John told the tax collectors and soldiers
When John the Baptist preached by the Jordan, crowds came to be baptised, and among them were two groups of people who held public power. Luke records what John told them:
Then came also publicans to be baptized, and said unto him, Master, what shall we do? And he said unto them, Exact no more than that which is appointed you. And the soldiers likewise demanded of him, saying, And what shall we do? And he said unto them, Do violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely; and be content with your wages.
The publicans were tax collectors working for the Roman system. They were widely despised, partly because they collaborated with the occupying power and partly because the system allowed them to collect more than was required and keep the difference. The soldiers were probably men in the service of Herod Antipas or attached to Roman administration. Both groups held power over ordinary people, and both had well-known ways of abusing it.
Notice what John did not tell them. He did not tell them to resign. He did not tell them their jobs were incompatible with repentance. He told them how to do their jobs differently.
NuggetTo the tax collectors: “Exact no more than that which is appointed you.” Collect what the law requires and no more. No inflated assessments. No private surcharge.
To the soldiers: “Do violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely; and be content with your wages.” The word translated do violence means to shake someone down, to extort by intimidation. Accuse falsely suggests using false charges to extract money. Soldiers in that world could easily supplement their pay by threatening people. John told them to stop, and to live on what they were paid.
Every one of these instructions concerns the use of public power. And every one would be immediately recognisable in many public offices today: the official who demands something extra before he will process a file, the officer at a checkpoint who invents an offence, the clerk who loses documents until he is “settled.” Repentance, for a person in public service, shows itself in how the power of the office is used.
Later in Luke’s Gospel, a chief tax collector named Zacchaeus met Jesus and said, “if I have taken any thing from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold” (Luke 19:8). That is what grace looked like in the life of a public servant: restitution, and a new way of handling the office.
What the Lord requires
The prophet Micah spoke to a nation whose leaders were deeply religious and deeply corrupt. In chapter 6 he imagines a worshipper asking how he can please God:
Wherewith shall I come before the LORD , and bow myself before the high God? shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old? Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?
The questions escalate. Should I bring burnt offerings? Calves a year old? Thousands of rams? Ten thousand rivers of oil? My own firstborn child? The worshipper assumes that God wants something extravagant and religious. Then comes the answer: “He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?”
Micah’s contemporaries did not lack religion. Earlier in his book he describes rulers who “judge for reward” and priests who “teach for hire,” while they claim, “Is not the LORD among us?” (Micah 3:11). They had the sacrifices and the religious language. They did not have justice.
That is a word for every believer in public office. God is not impressed by the religious display of an officeholder who is unjust. Prayer before meetings, verses on the office wall and generous donations to church projects mean very little if the files are handled with favouritism and the budget is quietly diverted.
What does the Lord require? “To do justly”: to make fair decisions, apply rules impartially and treat people according to what is right rather than who they are. “To love mercy”: to care for people, especially those with little power, and to use discretion with compassion. “And to walk humbly with thy God”: to hold the office knowing that you answer to Someone higher, that it was given to you and can be taken away.
Christian witness in public office does not rest on a religious identity the officeholder claims. It rests on how the trust of the office is used: impartially, justly and for the good of those who must live with its decisions.
No error or fault
Daniel spent most of his life as a senior official in foreign governments, first under the Babylonians and then under the Persians. He served kings who did not share his faith. And by the time of Darius, he had risen almost to the top:
Then this Daniel was preferred above the presidents and princes, because an excellent spirit was in him; and the king thought to set him over the whole realm. Then the presidents and princes sought to find occasion against Daniel concerning the kingdom; but they could find none occasion nor fault; forasmuch as he was faithful, neither was there any error or fault found in him. Then said these men, We shall not find any occasion against this Daniel, except we find it against him concerning the law of his God.
“Because an excellent spirit was in him.” Daniel was simply very good at his work. The king was planning to put him over the whole kingdom. Naturally, that provoked his colleagues, and they went looking for something to use against him.
Notice where they looked first: “concerning the kingdom.” They examined his administration. His accounts. His decisions. His handling of public resources. “But they could find none occasion nor fault; forasmuch as he was faithful, neither was there any error or fault found in him.” The word faithful means trustworthy, reliable. Nothing in his conduct of office could be used against him.
So they concluded, “We shall not find any occasion against this Daniel, except we find it against him concerning the law of his God.” The only way to attack Daniel was through his faith, because his public conduct was clean. That is a remarkable testimony. Daniel’s faith was visible, and it eventually put him in the lions’ den. But it was his faithfulness in the work of government that left his enemies with nothing else to use.
There is a lesson here for believers in public service. Your faith should be known. But the first thing people should be able to say about your office is that it is clean. Let them search your files and find nothing. Then, if opposition comes because of your faith, it will come against a life that has already commended the God you serve.
Joseph and Nehemiah: power used for the people
Joseph is perhaps the Bible’s greatest example of a public administrator. When he interpreted Pharaoh’s dreams of seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine, he also proposed a plan: appoint officers, gather a fifth of the harvest during the good years and store it in the cities, “that the land perish not through the famine” (Genesis 41:36). Pharaoh put him in charge. For fourteen years he ran what was essentially a national food security programme. When the famine came, it was not only Egypt that survived: “all countries came into Egypt to Joseph for to buy corn” (Genesis 41:57). His administration saved countless lives, including those of the family who had sold him into slavery.
Joseph shows that good public administration is itself a way of serving God. Planning, storage, logistics and honest distribution are not unspiritual work. They are how a society is protected from disaster.
Nehemiah shows something else: the refusal of entitlements. He was appointed governor of Judah by the Persian king, and the office came with an allowance funded by taxes on the people. Here is what he wrote:
But the former governors that had been before me were chargeable unto the people, and had taken of them bread and wine, beside forty shekels of silver; yea, even their servants bare rule over the people: but so did not I, because of the fear of God. Yea, also I continued in the work of this wall, neither bought we any land: and all my servants were gathered thither unto the work.
“The former governors that had been before me were chargeable unto the people.” They took food, wine and silver from a population that was already struggling. Even their servants “bare rule over the people,” throwing their weight around because of their connection to the governor. “But so did not I, because of the fear of God.” Nehemiah declined what previous officeholders had taken as normal. He worked on the wall alongside the people, and he did not use his position to acquire land.
He explains his reason a few verses later: “yet for all this required not I the bread of the governor, because the bondage was heavy upon this people” (Nehemiah 5:18). He looked at the burden his office placed on ordinary people, and he chose to lighten it, even at personal cost.
Not every legitimate allowance must be refused. But Nehemiah’s question is a searching one for anyone in public service. What does my office cost the people? Are there privileges I have accepted simply because everyone before me accepted them? Is my convoy, my entourage or my staff behaving as though they rule over the public?
Partiality in religious clothing
One of the most persistent temptations in public office is favouritism. God’s law addressed it directly:
Thou shalt not wrest judgment; thou shalt not respect persons, neither take a gift: for a gift doth blind the eyes of the wise, and pervert the words of the righteous. That which is altogether just shalt thou follow, that thou mayest live, and inherit the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
“Thou shalt not wrest judgment; thou shalt not respect persons, neither take a gift.” To respect persons means to let someone’s identity, status or relationship to you determine the outcome. “For a gift doth blind the eyes of the wise.” Even a wise person’s judgement is distorted by a gift. “That which is altogether just shalt thou follow.” The Hebrew repeats the word: justice, justice shalt thou follow. Pursue it with everything you have.
When Jethro advised Moses on appointing leaders, he said they should be “able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness” (Exodus 18:21). And James tells believers, “have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons” (James 2:1).
Here is the subtle danger. Most believers in public office understand that taking a bribe is wrong. Fewer recognise that favouring their own church, their own ethnic group, their own town or their own family is the same sin in different clothes. A pastor’s list of fourteen names can feel very different from a contractor’s envelope. It comes with prayer and warmth and talk of God’s purpose. But if it asks you to move people up the list because of who they are rather than what the criteria say, it is asking you to respect persons.
This is where many believers in government have damaged the name of Christ. Citizens notice when a Christian official fills his department with members of his own church. They notice when contracts go to people who attend the same fellowship. They draw conclusions about what Christian faith means. Esther was placed in the palace “for such a time as this” to save a people threatened with destruction (Esther 4:14), not to arrange advantages for her friends.
The believer’s witness in public office is impartiality. Treat the Muslim applicant and the Christian applicant by the same standard. Treat the stranger’s file as carefully as your cousin’s. Then people will learn something true about your God.
Giving account
When the prophet Samuel stepped down from leading Israel, he did something rare. He stood before the whole nation and invited them to bring any charge against him:
Behold, here I am: witness against me before the LORD , and before his anointed: whose ox have I taken? or whose ass have I taken? or whom have I defrauded? whom have I oppressed? or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind mine eyes therewith? and I will restore it you. And they said, Thou hast not defrauded us, nor oppressed us, neither hast thou taken ought of any man’s hand. And he said unto them, The LORD is witness against you, and his anointed is witness this day, that ye have not found ought in my hand. And they answered, He is witness.
“Whose ox have I taken? or whose ass have I taken? or whom have I defrauded? whom have I oppressed? or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind mine eyes therewith?” Samuel had held power for decades. He invited public scrutiny of all of it. And the people answered, “Thou hast not defrauded us, nor oppressed us, neither hast thou taken ought of any man’s hand.”
Imagine being able to say that at the end of a career in public service. Imagine leaving office and inviting anyone with a complaint to come forward, confident that your record would stand.
That kind of ending is built over many years of ordinary decisions. Keep records that would survive scrutiny. Declare your assets honestly where the law requires it. Declare gifts and conflicts of interest. Recuse yourself from decisions involving your relatives or your business interests. Welcome audits. Live within your lawful income, so that your lifestyle tells no story your salary cannot explain. If you hold elected office, remember that you will one day stand where Samuel stood, before the people you served. More importantly, you will stand before God.
The believer’s conscience in public life
A few final words, for those in office and for every believer who is a citizen.
Christians hold different views about politics. Sincere believers support different parties, favour different policies and disagree about how best to govern a nation. That is to be expected. Scripture gives us principles of justice, mercy and righteousness, but it does not hand us a party manifesto. A church that ties the gospel to one political faction risks making Christ look like a party mascot. Let us hold our political convictions with humility and treat believers who disagree as brothers and sisters.
Every believer is called to pray for those in authority. Paul wrote, “I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; For kings, and for all that are in authority” (1 Timothy 2:1-2). That prayer is not limited to leaders we voted for. God told the exiles in Babylon, “seek the peace of the city whither I have caused you to be carried away captives, and pray unto the LORD for it” (Jeremiah 29:7). Pray for your local government chairman, your governor and your president, whoever they are, that they may rule justly.
Some believers are called to serve in public office directly. That calling is honourable, and the nation needs people of integrity in every arm of government. If you are considering it, count the cost, find people who will hold you accountable, and settle your conscience before the first envelope arrives.
There will be moments when conscience cannot comply. The Hebrew midwives “feared God, and did not as the king of Egypt commanded them” (Exodus 1:17). Daniel kept praying when the decree forbade it. If you are instructed to falsify records, divert funds or act unjustly, you may have to refuse, report the wrongdoing through lawful channels, or resign. Do so respectfully and truthfully, and seek wise counsel and legal advice where needed. Courage in such moments is part of representing Christ.
Above all, remember that Christian witness in public life rests on conduct more than on labels. The world has seen enough officials who announce their faith loudly and govern unjustly. What it needs to see are believers who govern well.
Jummai did not open the portal that night. She prayed instead, and the next morning she called her pastor and asked if she could see him.
She went to his office after work and returned the white envelope. “Sir, I love these children,” she said. “I know some of them very well. And I want you to know that every one of them who applied will be assessed carefully, by the same criteria as everyone else. But I cannot move them up the list because they are ours. If I do that, some child in another local government who scored higher will lose a place because of me. I would be serving our church by being unjust to someone else’s child. I do not think Jesus would want me to do that.”
PunchlineThe pastor was quiet for a long time. He was not pleased, and he did not hide it. But he did not argue.
The committee met for three weeks. Jummai asked that every shortlisting decision be recorded against the published criteria, and that the final list, with scores, be made available to any applicant who requested it. Nine of the fourteen students on the pastor’s list qualified on merit and received bursaries. Five did not. One of those five was the girl who had lost her father. Jummai helped her family apply for a church welfare fund and a private foundation’s grant, and the girl started university that October.
When the list was published, her deputy came into her office and closed the door. “I have seen many directors handle this board,” he said. “Everybody knows the ones who pray. This year we saw what the prayer means.” He nodded once and went back to his desk.
Months later, the pastor preached a sermon on Micah 6:8. He did not mention the envelope. But afterwards, at the church door, he shook Jummai’s hand a little longer than usual. “To do justly,” he said quietly. “Thank you for reminding me.”
Teaching Companion
For Reflection
- If you hold any kind of public responsibility, whose lives are affected by your decisions? How often do you think about them?
- John the Baptist gave tax collectors and soldiers specific instructions for their jobs. What would his instructions be for your role?
- Where are you tempted to “respect persons,” favouring your own church, ethnic group, town or family? How would impartiality look in that situation?
- Could you stand where Samuel stood and invite anyone to bring a charge against your conduct? What would need to change for that to be possible?
- How do you pray for those in authority, especially those you did not vote for or do not agree with?
This Week
Choose one leader in public authority over you, at local, state or national level, and pray for them by name every day this week, using 1 Timothy 2:1-2. If you hold any public responsibility yourself, take an honest inventory of three things: any privilege of your office you have accepted simply because others did, as Nehemiah considered; any decision in which you are favouring someone because of who they are; and any record or declaration you have neglected. Put one of them right before the week ends.
A Prayer
Lord God, You have shown me what is good: to do justly, to love mercy and to walk humbly with You. I pray for all who hold authority in my nation, that they may serve for the good of the people. Where You have given me any measure of public trust, make me faithful like Daniel, generous like Nehemiah and clean like Samuel. Keep me from the gift that blinds the eyes and from the partiality that hides behind religious words. Give me courage to refuse what is unjust and humility to serve those who will live with my decisions. Let my conduct, more than my claims, make Your name known. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Truth received brings freedom. Truth believed establishes the heart.
Scripture quotations are from the King James Version. · Illustrations using first names only are composites unless stated otherwise.