“Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and unto God what is God’s.”
These words from Jesus in Matthew 22:21 are often quoted when the subject of taxation arises in Christian circles.
But in our modern age—when governments not only build roads and defend borders but also fund abortion clinics, gender transitions for minors, and drag queen story hours—the moral calculus becomes far more complex.
Should a Christian view taxation as theft?
The question cannot be answered with a simple yes or no. Scripture offers principles rather than economic blueprints.
Government is ordained by God (Rom. 13:1–7), and taxation is portrayed as a legitimate function of civil authority. Yet governments are also accountable to God, and Christians are not required to offer blind allegiance when those governments fund or promote evil.
This essay will explore both sides of the issue. First, it will examine the biblical legitimacy and civic benefits of taxation—especially the infrastructure and legal order that allow Christian entrepreneurs to prosper.
Then it will assess the ways that excessive taxation is used to fund immoral policies, many of which violate the consciences of biblically faithful believers.
Finally, it will discuss how such taxation can restrict Christian giving, redirecting God’s resources to godless agendas and, in effect, allowing the state to play the role of god.
The Biblical Framework for Civil Authority and Taxation
The Authority of the State
Romans 13:1–7 is the foundational New Testament passage regarding civil government:
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… For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing (vv. 1, 6).
Paul does not describe the Roman Empire as righteous or godly, yet he affirms its authority.
This echoes Jesus’ teaching to pay the tax to Caesar (Matt. 22:21) even though Caesar was a pagan despot.
Government, even flawed government, plays a God-ordained role in restraining evil and promoting civic order.
Legitimate Purposes of Taxation
Taxation, in its rightful form, is not theft—it is a tool to fulfill God’s purpose for government: to be not a terror to good conduct, but to bad (Rom. 13:3).
Taxes fund a range of necessary civil goods:
- Courts and law enforcement to punish evildoers and settle disputes
- Roads, bridges, and ports that facilitate commerce and transportation
- National defense and border security
- Systems to protect property rights and enforce contracts
Without these, an entrepreneur could not launch a business, a family could not safely travel, and a community could not flourish.
Jesus and Taxes: An Ethic of Conscience
Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 22:15–22 is more than a tax tip—it is a statement about dual allegiance.
God is supreme, but Caesar has a role. Christians are not anarchists.
However, Jesus never said Caesar had the right to demand everything, nor did He endorse every use of tax revenue.
Instead, He distinguished what belongs to God and what belongs to Caesar—a distinction blurred when the state funds evil.
What Christians Gain From a Justly Taxed Society
Infrastructure That Enables Flourishing
Consider what taxes, when rightly used, provide:
- Transportation Infrastructure: Roads, airports, and shipping lanes are the arteries of economic life. No small business owner could pave a highway or dredge a harbor alone.
- Legal Framework: The enforcement of contracts, recognition of property rights, and fair arbitration of disputes are functions of a just legal system—all tax-funded.
- Public Safety and National Defense: From local police to national defense, safety enables Christian families and entrepreneurs to thrive without fear of bandits or foreign invaders.
- Public Health Systems: Even in a fallen world, disease control and sanitation are basic goods. The Christian entrepreneur can’t do much if cholera wipes out his clientele.
In this sense, taxation plays a facilitating role in human flourishing. Just as Israel paid tithes and taxes to sustain Levitical services and civil order in the theocracy, modern Christians pay taxes to sustain public institutions in secular states. In this limited context, taxation is not theft but stewardship.
When Taxation Funds Evil: A Christian’s Moral Dilemma
Paying for Abortion, Gender Ideology, and Immorality
The problem arises not with taxation per se, but how tax dollars are used.
- Abortion: Through direct federal funding (e.g., Title X) or through subsidies to abortion providers like Planned Parenthood, millions of taxpayer dollars fund the systematic ending of innocent lives.
- Gender Ideology: In some states, tax dollars pay for “gender-affirming care,” for minors—hormone therapy, surgeries, and psychological indoctrination.
- Sexual Indoctrination in Schools: Public schools, funded by property taxes, often promote curricula that undermine biblical views of sex, family, and identity.
Such use of tax dollars directly violates biblical ethics. Scripture is clear: Rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering toward slaughter (Prov. 24:11). Can a Christian in good conscience fund what God condemns?
Taxation Becomes Theft When It Funds Wickedness
While basic taxation for civil order is biblically defensible, taxation that underwrites evil policies is another matter. The commandment You shall not steal (Ex. 20:15) applies even to governments. A state that extracts wealth from its people under threat of penalty and then uses it to destroy the innocent or promote perversion has committed theft on a grand scale.
Historical Warnings
Church history offers grim lessons: from Rome taxing citizens to fund gladiatorial games and temples to pagan gods, to modern regimes subsidizing euthanasia and ideological propaganda. As government grows in scope and control, so too does its power to fund rebellion against God.
Taxation’s Impact on Christian Giving and Kingdom Work
Biblical Generosity: Directed by Conscience, Not Coercion
2 Corinthians 9:7 says, Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
Biblical giving is personal, purposeful, and directed by conscience. But excessive taxation removes the choice, replacing cheerful giving with coerced redistribution.
A family that pays 35% in income taxes, 10% in sales taxes, and property taxes on top may find themselves unable to tithe or support missions, crisis pregnancy centers, or Christian education. Government becomes a rival to the Church—not only in ideology but in funding.
Empowering the Wicked, Disempowering the Righteous
By forcibly extracting funds and using them to promote sin, the government functions as an anti-steward.
Money that could have translated into Bibles, orphanages, and food for widows is instead spent on hormone blockers and DEI consultants.
Worse still, this financial dominance signals who is in charge.
The state, not God, decides what constitutes justice, mercy, and human flourishing. This echoes the tyrannical regimes of the past—Babylon, Rome, and more recently, secular statism.
When the State Becomes “God”: The Idolatry of Statism
The Rise of the All-Encompassing State
When a government assumes for itself the role of defining morality, redistributing wealth, and shaping the next generation’s values, it becomes a de facto god. This is not hyperbole. Scripture warns of nations and rulers who exalt themselves:
The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord and against his Anointed (Psalm 2:2).
The modern state often functions as a rival deity. It claims the right to determine who is male or female, what constitutes a family, what life is worth protecting, and how resources should be allocated. It even assumes authority over the education and formation of children, often against parental conscience.
This is more than overreach—it is idolatry. When the state claims divine prerogatives, it becomes a beast-like power reminiscent of Revelation 13. It does not simply mismanage funds; it lays claim to the very hearts, minds, and souls of its people.
The Christian’s Allegiance and Limits of Submission
Romans 13 calls for submission to civil authorities, but it is not a blank check.
The same apostle who wrote Romans 13 was eventually executed by the Roman state for refusing to compromise his faith. Acts 5:29 is the key balance: We must obey God rather than men.
This principle applies to taxation when it becomes entangled with idolatry or oppression. Christians may still be required to pay taxes (Matt. 17:24–27), but they are not required to affirm, applaud, or remain silent about how those taxes are used. Instead, they must speak prophetically, like John the Baptist before Herod, like Paul before Agrippa.
Can a Christian Justify Viewing Taxation as Theft?
Defining Theft Biblically
The Eighth Commandment, “You shall not steal,” condemns any unjust taking of another’s property without consent. While taxation, in itself, is not theft—provided it fulfills legitimate civic ends—taxation becomes theft when it violates two principles:
- Violation of Conscience – When tax money is taken to support what God condemns.
- Violation of Proportion – When government takes more than it needs and uses it to expand its own control.
Proverbs 29:4 states, By justice a king builds up the land, but he who exacts gifts tears it down. Excessive taxation tears down both prosperity and justice, particularly when used to subsidize ungodliness.
The Christian’s Conscience and Moral Agency
Romans 14:23 tells us, Whatever does not proceed from faith is sin. For the Christian whose conscience is grieved by taxation that funds abortion or transgender surgeries for minors, this becomes a moral crisis.
They cannot simply shrug and say, “Well, Caesar gets what’s Caesar’s.” Caesar is not entitled to what belongs to God. The conscience, as Martin Luther declared, must be captive to the Word of God.
When Christians are compelled by law to fund evil, they are being spiritually coerced. They may not be able to legally resist taxation, but they can—and must—resist complicity by speaking out, voting accordingly, and supporting alternatives.
Do Government Social Programs Relieve the Christian of His Duty to the Poor?
The Temptation to Delegate Compassion
One of the most common defenses of high taxation is the claim that it funds government programs to aid the poor—welfare, food assistance, housing subsidies, Medicaid, and more. Many Christians, especially in prosperous countries, have quietly accepted this argument: “Since my taxes already help the poor, my personal obligation is fulfilled.”
This reasoning may feel convenient, but it is theologically flawed.
Scripture calls for personal compassion, voluntary generosity, and relational mercy. From the Mosaic Law to the early church, care for the poor was never outsourced to a faceless bureaucracy. It was mediated through families, communities, synagogues, and churches—not governments.
- In Deuteronomy 15:7–8, God commands: If among you, one of your brothers should become poor… you shall open your hand to him.
- In Acts 2:45, believers sold their possessions and distributed to any who had need—not under Roman command, but through Christian charity.
- In James 2:15–16, the faithless man is not the one who fails to pay taxes, but the one who says, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without offering help himself.
Biblical giving is not measured by tax compliance. It is measured by compassion and conscience.
Bureaucratic Charity vs. Biblical Mercy
Government programs are impersonal by design. They distribute funds based on regulations, not relationships. This inevitably breeds waste, fraud, and dependency—undermining the very dignity that Christian charity aims to restore.
Contrast that with the church, where mercy is:
- Discerning – Ministers and members know the individuals in need and can address root causes (e.g., sin, addiction, brokenness).
- Accountable – Help is tied to fellowship and discipleship.
- Hopeful – Aid comes with spiritual encouragement and community restoration.
The apostle Paul taught that if anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat (2 Thess. 3:10). Government programs rarely uphold this kind of biblical accountability.
Taxation as a Moral Displacement
When Christians assume that the state is responsible for caring for the poor, several unintended consequences follow:
- Personal responsibility is diminished – Generosity becomes a line item on a tax return, not a spiritual discipline.
- Churches retreat from mercy ministries – Why fund a food pantry when SNAP benefits exist?
- The poor are isolated – They become clients of a system, not members of a community.
- Moral confusion deepens – Christians begin to confuse state action with gospel obedience.
In essence, Caesar receives the offering that should have gone through the hands of the church.
The Mandate Remains
Even if a Christian pays high taxes, Scripture does not reduce the command to be generous:
“As for the rich in this present age… they are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share” (1 Tim. 6:17–18).
This is not optional, and it is not fulfilled by IRS withholding.
The Christian must view his giving not as redundant to the welfare state, but as a spiritual counterculture—a witness to a better kingdom and a better King.
Seeking a Biblical Alternative: A Christian Philosophy of Taxation
Limited Government and the Jurisdiction of the State
Scripture does not endorse big government or big redistribution. It affirms limited roles for state, church, and family. The Reformed tradition—especially as expressed by Kuyperian thought—recognizes “sphere sovereignty”: that each institution has its own God-given realm of responsibility.
- The state is to punish evil and reward good (Rom. 13).
- The church is to disciple the nations (Matt. 28:19).
- The family is to train children and pass on heritage (Deut. 6:6–9).
Taxation that allows the state to intrude into the spheres of church and family not only overreaches—it usurps God’s design.
Rethinking Taxation from a Christian Worldview
A Christian view of taxation includes:
- Proportionality: Low, fair taxes that reflect civic needs, not ideological ambitions.
- Transparency: Clear reporting on how funds are used.
- Moral boundaries: No use of tax revenue to promote or fund practices condemned in Scripture.
- Subsidiarity: Delegating as many functions as possible to families, churches, and local communities, rather than the federal state.
This philosophy does not deny the legitimacy of civil government—it seeks to reclaim its proper limits under God.
Stewardship and the Tragedy of Misallocated Resources
Every Dollar Has a Direction
Christian stewardship is about more than budgeting—it’s about intentional investment in eternity. As Jesus said, Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also (Matt. 6:21). Taxes, however, forcibly redirect that treasure away from kingdom purposes and toward humanistic, secular ones.
If a family gives 10% of their income in tithe but loses 40% in taxes, the government has become the dominant “ministry partner” in their financial life. Yet unlike the church, the state does not feed the hungry in Christ’s name—it enforces its own gospel of inclusion, environmentalism, or sexual autonomy.
Impact on Christian Charities and Institutions
When tax burdens rise:
- Donations decline. Ministries report smaller budgets.
- Christian schools struggle. Families can’t afford tuition after property and income taxes.
- Crisis pregnancy centers lack funds while Planned Parenthood receives federal dollars.
- Missions shrink while foreign aid supports population control or LGBT outreach overseas.
In short, forced taxation displaces free Christian giving. This is not accidental. Many in elite political circles know that if they can control the purse, they can control the people.
Toward a Christian Resistance: Speaking, Voting, Giving
Speaking the Truth in the Public Square
The Christian must not retreat into privatized religion. Tax policy is moral policy. When Christians see taxation funding evil, they must:
- Vote for legislators who will represent Christian values
- Testify publicly
- Write letters to the editor, articles, and petitions
- Call legislators to express opinions on legislation that funds evil
- Educate their churches
This is not partisan—it is prophetic. Silence is not neutrality. It is complicity.
Voting and Political Action
Christians must vote not merely on tax rates but on what taxes fund. A candidate who lowers taxes but supports abortion is not righteous. But neither is one who supports biblical life ethics while advocating for bloated, redistributive government.
The ideal is a candidate who understands government’s limits and respects conscience.
Practicing Strategic Generosity
Even when burdened by taxes, Christians can still practice wise, intentional giving:
- Support biblically faithful ministries and education
- Help local families directly
- Fund alternatives to government programs (homeschool co-ops, Christian counseling)
Every dollar matters. And every dollar given with a kingdom focus is a protest against the idolatry of the state.
Conclusion: Giving to Caesar and to God
Taxation is not inherently theft. But it can become theft when it violates God’s moral law and the Christian’s conscience. Scripture commands submission to civil authority, yet limits that submission when God’s law is at stake.
A Christian must not be apathetic about how tax dollars are used. To fund wickedness with blind acceptance is to misplace one’s stewardship. We are accountable for how we respond—even when the money is taken from us by law.
In a world where governments increasingly fund what God forbids, the faithful Christian must draw the line—not in rebellion, but in reasoned resistance. They must give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s—but never confuse the two.
S.D.G.,
Robert Sparkman
MMXXV
rob@basedchristianity.org
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