V. 17.— Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves: for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account, that they may do it with joy, and not with grief: for that is unprofitable for you. In verse 7th and 9th the Apostle had exhorted the Hebrews to remember their departed leaders, who had spoken to them the word of the Lord, and cautioned them against being carried away with diverse and strange doctrines, from the consideration that Jesus is the same yesterday and for ever. Here he admonishes them to obey their leaders, and to submit to them. The authority given by the Lord to the bishops or elders of the churches of Christ is altogether different from the authority with which civil rulers are invested. The authority of the spiritual ruler is to be maintained by instruction and persuasion, and is not to be enforced by civil pains and penalties, like the authority of the civil ruler. We have an illustration of this in the history of our Lord. In consequence of the doctrine in one of His discourses proving very offensive, many of His disciples went away. He neither prevented nor threatened them, but said to the twelve, “ Will ye also go away?” But they were restrained the conviction that He was the Christ, the Son of God. John 6:67; John 6:69. So the overseers are to commend themselves to every man’ s conscience, and to rule by the Word of God. The duty of submission is enforced, first, because they watch for the souls of those over whom they are placed, and must give account of the manner in which they have fulfilled their trust.