URC Daily Devotion 10 June 2026

Church and State 3 
 
Romans 13.6-8 
 
For the same reason you also pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, busy with this very thing. Pay to all what is due to them—taxes to whom taxes are due, revenue to whom revenue is due, respect to whom respect is due, honour to whom honour is due. Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.
 
Reflection
 
Yesterday, we heard what Jesus had to say about paying taxes. Today, we return to Paul’s advice in Romans 13, which tackles the same question. Did he, I wonder, know that Jesus said, ‘Give to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.’?
 
Paul’s answer to the implied question from the Christians in Rome is remarkably similar. Taxes should be paid to those to whom they are due. But that is not the end of the story. As well as owing taxes, we owe honour to those to whom honour is due, and we owe love to everyone.
 
Paying taxes is not all bad. In 2016 our family moved house, and the sale went through at the beginning of the 2016-17 tax year. As a result, we paid no Stamp Duty to the UK Government, but the newly introduced Land Transaction Tax to the Welsh Government, becoming one of the first households for well over 700 years to pay taxes directly to the government of Wales.  Never have I filled in a tax form with greater pleasure or pride!
 
For ten years I represented the churches of Wales, including the URC, in their dealings with the Welsh Government and the Senedd (Welsh Parliament). Periodically, I was challenged by those who disagreed with government policies to be more assertive, to “battle against them” as one church official put it. But I always felt on the surest ground when I was able not just to argue, but to point to what local churches were doing in their neighbourhoods. The Welsh Government generally recognised that we did try to pay our debt of love to our neighbours, and that was the basis on which I could assert that we should honour one another in our respective responsibilities.
 
Prayer
 
Loving God,
help me to pay promptly and cheerfully 
what I owe to those to whom it is owed –
taxes to those authorities who can rightly charge them;
bills to those who have given me service and deserve their wage,
honour to those in Church and state to whom honour is due,
and love to all my neighbours, whether I agree with them or not.
Amen.