Thursday, June 04, 2009
Murder can't be an option
Linda Whitlock
Recent columns
- Seeing racism where it's not
- Sanford could still be a hero
- Skeptics or traitors?
- School freedom is elusive
From the RoundTable blog
At Jesus' arrest, Peter, to defend his Lord, drew his sword and cut off the ear of the high priest's slave. Jesus healed the slave and chastised Peter. "Put your sword back into its place," he said, "for all those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword."
Those prophetic words explain both the sad end of abortionist George Tiller and the quick and unequivocal statements prominent pro-life Christians issued denouncing the killer's actions.
Without question, the Christian pro-life community hoped Tiller would lose his recent court case and spend time in jail for his actions. But no Christian worthy of the name would call for or even wish for his murder.
Cynics in the pro-abortion community may believe pro-lifers are crying crocodile tears over Tiller's death. Or that, if the denunciations are sincere, it's only because Tiller's murder hurts the pro-life movement by making him a martyr to the pro-abortion cause.
If so, they're mistaken.
Not that Tiller's likely martyrdom isn't a real cause for concern. Along with the probability that, as the result of his murder, pro-lifers will now be under greater scrutiny from law enforcement agencies, some of which (like the Department of Homeland Security, apparently) already consider them suspect.
The denunciations are genuine because Christians who understand and try to live by the Bible know it's wrong to appropriate for themselves powers that God has kept for himself alone or assigned to some other entity, such as the state.
That was the point theologian Al Mohler passionately drove home Monday on both his radio program and in a commentary posted online at his blog and in the On Faith section of The Washington Post.
"The church," Mohler writes, "has reached a basic moral consensus on issues of violence and governmental obedience, and this consensus requires that Christian citizens work within legal, judicial and political means to persuade governing authorities concerning what is good, right, just and honoring to God."
"Those who operate outside of this consensus," Mohler continues, "and perform acts of violence are rightly understood to arrogate authority to themselves in a way that violates not only the laws of men but the law of God."
As Paul makes clear in Romans 12-13, God has assigned the authority to wield the sword against evildoers to the state, not to individuals like Peter in the Garden of Gethsemane or Scott Roeder, Tiller's alleged murderer. And God has reserved the right to exact vengeance to himself.
For these and other reasons, Paul instructs Christians to obey the law and to submit to the governing authorities. Christians get a pass only when the state requires them to violate God's law. For those compelled to action, peaceful civil disobedience, Mohler says, is the only option.
I don't know if Roeder claims to be a Christian. If he does, given Paul's clear teaching on the Christian's responsibility to the state, neither he nor any other Christian can claim a biblical warrant for usurping the state's God-given authority, even in the service of justice.
Christians may, however, use whatever legitimate means are at hand to bring about that same justice, and this pro-life Christians have been doing for the 3½ decades since Roe v. Wade was decided.
Mirroring William Wilberforce's and the Clapham Sect's fight to end slavery and the slave trade in Great Britain, the effort to end, or at least restrict, legalized abortion in the U.S. has been long and difficult.
But in recent years, both laws and hearts have begun to change. In the past year alone, according to a recent Gallup poll, the number of Americans calling themselves pro-life rose from 44 percent to 51 percent. Cause for rejoicing? Yes. But George Tiller's death is not.
Though Tiller's murder bears tragic testimony to the truth that those who take up the sword will die by it, pro-life Christians must take no pleasure in seeing Christ's words fulfilled. To do so would violate all the pro-life movement stands for and jeopardize its very soul.
Whitlock, a Roanoke Times columnist, is an adjunct English professor who lives in Salem.
