In regard to recent conversations I have had dealing with the rise of lawlessness in this nation, especially among those on the left who are accelerating their obstruction to law enforcement efforts by ICE to rid communities of criminal illegals, I am including a section from the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Christians at Rome.
Keep in mind when reading this, that when this letter was written, Rome, while yet to see the rise of the beast Nero and his fanatical persection of Christians, was still no friend to the followers of Christ. Previous to his letter ( approximately 57 AD) , the emperor Caligula (37-41 AD) had commanded images of himself to be set up in temples and worshipped and claimed to be divine. Not exactly someone who would view both the Jews and Christians with a great deal of admiration!
I chose a particular translation of the Bible that I rarely use ( I prefer the New American Standard Bible) but which I found to have a very good rendering of chapter 13 of his letter.
From the New Testament for Everyone translation: Romans 13: 1- 5:
“Every person must be subject to the ruling authorities. There is no authority, you see, except from God, and those that exist have been put in place by God. As a result, anyone who rebels against authority is resisting what God has set up, and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers hold no terrors for people who do good, but only for people who do evil.
If you want to have no fear of the ruling power, do what is good, and it will praise you. It is God’s servant, you see, for you and your good. But if you do evil, be afraid; the sword it carries is no empty gesture. It is God’s servant, you see: an agent of justice to bring his anger on evildoers. That is why it is necessary to submit, not only to avoid punishment but because of conscience.”
There is so much to unpack in this which time and space preclude me from entering into, but a quick synopsis is appropos to the woman who was shot and killed while interfering with the law enforcement actions of ICE.
The Scriptures teach us that man’s nature has been corrupted by sin as a result of the fall of Adam Without some sort of restraint upon his tendency to do evil, life here would soon become a horror and freedom would vanish. The law of the jungle would prevail in which the strong would dominate the weak and crush those who refuse to submit to their will. God, in his infinite goodness, therefore has given us institutions that are there to restrain this tendency towards evil. One of those is what Paul is referring to.
Consider for a moment this statement from the book of Ecclesiastes:
“Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed quickly, therefore the hearts of the sons of men are fully given to do evil. “ (Eccl 8:11)
When there are no consequences to lawbreaking, evil increases in a land. Tell me that this is not the very truth we are learning at this time in our country? Yet the means to avoid this is to understand what the Apostle Paul is teaching us; namely, that God has given the governing authorities “the sword”, the instrument to punish evildoers in his day, to mete out His vengeance against lawlessness. As he states, they are “His agents of justice to bring His anger upon evildoers.”
Those who resist the efforts of our law enforcement agents to rid our communities of violent illegals are not merely resisting these officers, but God Himself. Removing evildoers from our midst, those who have no legal right to be here in the first place I should add, is the express plan of God to provide for our good and our safety. Yet we see a growing number of radical leftists, egged on by their corrupt political leaders, constantly inserting themselves into this process and interfering with it, obstructing it in every manner possible.
Yet in spite of the absolute clarity of the Apostle Paul in this matter, there are still some “professing Christians” who are defending these lawbreakers and acting as their apologists. Those that do so have no understanding of the Scriptures, nor do they understand the ordinances that God has provided out of His goodness to curb the proliferation of evil.
Instead they cry up a false Christ who is all about love and knows nothing of justice nor of righteousness. Their idea of the love of Christ is that He sits idly by allowing evil to prosper and overrun societies to the point that they soon devolve into hell holes of wickedness and death. The more innocent people are killed by criminals, the more women are raped, the more drugs ravage our communities, the more robberies, vandalism and theft left unchecked, apparently the more these clueless “christians” believe that the love of Christ is demonstrated. What fools these have become!
I will leave you with some quotations from various passages in Scripture:
“The wicked strut about on every side, when vileness is exalted among the sons of mankind.: (Psalm 12:8)
“An unjust person is an abomination to the righteous, and one who is upright in the way is an abomination to the wicked” (Proverbs 29:27)
“Evil shall slay the wicked, and those who hate the righteous will be condemned.” (Psalm 34:21)
“By the blessing of the upright a city is exalted, but by the mouth of the wicked it is torn down.” (Proverbs 11:11)
“The Lord tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence His soul hates.” (Psalm 11:5)
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In a related matter, this pastor’s thoughts regarding illegal immigration are particularly apropos.