Do Not Kill

Sermon for North Hill Adventist Fellowship

Sabbath, March 24, 2012

Ezekiel 33:13-16

On face book this week, I've watched a young friend count down the hours till she could watch The Hunger Games which is opening at theaters across the country this weekend. From my reading of plot summaries, killing is central to the movie. In fact, killing is the key to life.

Last week when Karin and I were on vacation, we watched a John Wayne movie, True Grit. It, too, glorified deadly violence. For the hero, pointing a gun is his normal way of getting things done. The hero is dismissive of his sidekick, because he's not a very good killer. Even the female in the story--a teenager--is infatuated with violence. In her case it is the violence of deadly revenge. As in The Hunger Games, so in this movie (and in many Westerns) killing is the key to success. It is the key to life.  (A young friend told me I should make it clear that I was watching the original John Wayne version of True Grit, not the more recent remake. From what several people have told me, I would be even more troubled by the remake than the original--and that was repugnant enough.)

Is that true? Is killing the key to life? Is killing an effective tool for building the kingdom of God, for creating the sweet, good world we want for ourselves and our children?

Just this week I received an an email from a friend, asking about the commandment, “Thou shalt not kill.” What is the right way to apply that commandment to real life? It wasn't a hypothetical question.

Jack came upon a couple who were having an intense argument. Just as Joe arrived, the man slugged the woman and knocked her down. When the man went to kick the woman Joe hit him. The guy landed 10-12 feet away, giving Joe room, he said, to get between them. The man got to his feet and pulled a knife and charged. The assailant managed to cut Jack on the face before Joe grabbed the man's wrist and broke it to make him drop the knife.

The man didn't give up. He grabbed his knife with his other hand. So Joe grabbed that arm and dislocated the guys shoulder.

That pretty much stopped it. Finally the police arrived. It turned out the guy had an outstanding warrant. And there was a restraining order from the woman who happened to be his girl friend. The baby was his baby.

Jack was very clear on what he had done up to this point. He did what needed to be done. There was no ambiguity, no confusion. Then Jack asked: Should I have killed him?

Here's the way Jack put it: “The guy was attacking with a knife. He was aiming at my face or neck. That qualifies as deadly force. I could tell he wasn't very skilled which was why I knew I could disarm him easily. His intentions were clear to me, but I did nothing more than hurt him badly for a little while.  I wanted to do more though.  I wanted to kill him and by the laws of man I would have not committed a crime.

“But it is not the laws of man I try to live by.  When I broke his wrist and he went to get his knife, I could have reached into my jacket, pulled out my own knife and killed him or broken his neck instead of removing the arm from the socket. 

“As it is, he will heal, spend time in prison, and then possibly come after the mother and child again.

“Here's my question: Which is a greater sin?  Passing judgment and killing him here and now, or allowing him to live and thus opening the possibility that he might kill someone next time.  If he kills someone in the future then I am guilty of his crime because I did not permanently stop him.  If I try to look on the brighter side, maybe he will stop.  Maybe he will turn out OK and possibly turn to God.  That could happen, but it is rare in my eyes.  If I go with percentages, then I should have stopped him once and for all.”

So how should we think about violence?

Since we are Christians, we know Jesus' famous counsel:

“But I say, do not resist an evil person! If someone slaps you on the right cheek, offer the other cheek also.” Matthew 5:39. NLT

Some of us may also know another text. It's in Psalm 2:7-9. It is a prophecy about the work of the Messiah:

The king proclaims the LORD's decree: "The LORD said to me, 'You are my son.* Today I have become your Father.* Only ask, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, the whole earth as your possession. You will break* them with an iron rod and smash them like clay pots.'" (NLT)

Footnote: * Greek version reads rule. Compare Rev 2:27.

This text was understood by the Jews as a prophecy of the work of the Messiah. It was understood by Christians as a prophecy about Jesus. These are words about the divinely-appointed work of Jesus: Break them. Smash them. Get rid of evil by annihilating bad people.

In Revelation 2:7, Jesus, in vision, offers this same passage from Psalm 2 as a prophecy about the work of Christians themselves:

To him who overcomes and does my will to the end, I will give authority over the nations.

He will rule them with an iron scepter;

he will dash them to pieces like pottery

just as I have received authority from my Father.

So, on the one hand: Do not resist evil. When someone strikes you on one cheek, offer him the other. On the other: Followers of Jesus will be given authority over the nations. (Another way of saying this is, followers of Jesus will be given power over bad people.) They will smash them.

Have you ever wished you had the power to stomp bad people, to make them pay, to make them feel the weight of the evil they have done to others?

In Westerns, violence is often a straightforward, clean way to deal with bad people. The bad guys are irredeemably bad. The good guy shoots them. And everyone lives happily ever after. It's the same in the famous Bible story of David and Goliath. The good guy wins; the bad guy loses. Or to be more explicit: the good guy kills. The bad guy dies.

That's the way it's supposed to be. But real life doesn't usually work that way.

My guess is that's the way George Zimmerman saw it. He was out to find bad guys, and when he saw Trayvon Martin walking down the street, he thought he had found himself a bad guy. He was excited. He was going to be a hero, stopping a criminal from carrying out whatever nefarious plans he had. George trailed Trayvon—George in his black SUV, feeling smart and powerful—Trayvon walking, at first oblivious to his stalker. Trayvon probably did something George interpreted as confirmation of his suspicions. So George got out of his car to corral the bad guy. When the bad guy did something George wasn't expecting, George whipped out his gun and eliminated the bad guy. Only the “bad guy” wasn't a bad guy. He was simply a teenager, minding his own business, walking home from the store.

George Zimmerman saw the world as a place filled with bad people. He saw himself as a hero. A white knight. But his very effort to be a hero turned him into a monster. George's eagerness to rid the world of bad people led George himself into the depths of evil.

On the other hand, my friend Joe, used violence and I regard him as a hero. And I think if you had been there in the Walmart parking lot, you would have deeply admired his courage and his strength and skill in forcefully subduing that violent man.

How do we integrate all the various things the Bible tells us about violence. How do we find the godly wisdom?

Let's explore a curious story about violence that didn't happen.

When the people of Israel were getting ready to invade Palestine, God gave them emphatic, clear instructions: They were to wipe out the inhabitants. No quarter. No mercy. No exceptions.

When Israel prepared to attack Jericho, God reiterated his command for total annihilation. They were to kill every living thing--every man, woman, child and animal. It was a brutal, savage extermination. And they believed it was something God told them to do.

Next, they destroyed Ai. But this time they didn't kill the animals, just the people.

When the people of the region received news of these two slaughters, they all came together to fight the Israelites. Everybody except for one nation, the Gibeonites.

The Gibeonites sent a delegation to ask for a peace treaty with the Israelites. They were taken to Joshua, the leader of the israelites. Naturally, he interrogated them. “Who are you? Where do you come from?”

The delegation answered, “Your servants have come from a very distant country. Stories of your exploits have reached even as far as our country. We've heard about what your God did to the Egyptians. We've heard how he gave you victory over Sihon King of Heshbon and Og king of Bashan, whose capital was in Astaroth.

“Our elders, and in fact, all our people, commissioned us to come and offer ourselves as vassals. We're prepared to pay tribute. We just want to be on your side. We want to hook up with the God who is able to do what your God does.”

They can see Joshua's suspicion. He's not buying their story. “Look at our bread,” the Gibeonite ambassadors said. When we left home it was fresh out of the oven. See how dry and moldy it is now! These wine skins—when we filled them at home—they were brand new for the trip. Now see how cracked and weathered they are. Our sandals were new. Now, they're worn out. ”

Joshua and his assistants peered at the moldy bread. They ran their hands over the rough, weathered wine skins. They could see the ratty clothes the ambassadors were wearing. No self-respecting ambassador would show up to make a treaty dressed like, they could help it.

Joshua and his men conferred and agreed to make a treaty. Three days after the treaty was formally signed, the Israelites discovered they'd been fooled. The Gibeonites lived only three days travel away from the Israelite camp. They were outraged. The entire army marched the three days journey to the Gibeonite cities and set up camp.

The soldiers wanted to get right to work. They were soldiers. These people were Canaanites. It was extermination time. But Joshua would not let them. “We gave our word,” Joshua said. “And even when it comes to pagans, when we make a promise, we keep it. When we make a treaty, we honor it. When we sign a contract, it's binding.”

The soldiers grumbled against Joshua. There was a threat of mutiny. The entire army was outraged at Joshua's refusal to exterminate these worthless people. But Joshua was adamant. “Yes, they are Canaanites. Yes, they fooled us. No, we are not going to break our word. A treaty is a treaty. An oath is an oath.”

The Gibeonites watched all this nervously, to put it mildly. If Jericho hadn't been able to withstand these people, the Gibeonites didn't have a chance. Their fate was in the hands of Joshua. If he blinked, they were dead.

Joshua summoned the Gibeonite leaders. He was not happy. “Why did you deceive us, saying you lived a long way away? You agreed to tribute. You're going to pay dearly. You'll become our illegal immigrant workers. Well, actually what he said was, you will perpetually serve us as temple woodcutters and water carriers. You will be temple servants for all generations.

The Gibeonites answered, “Your servants had heard definite, detailed reports about the command your God gave you to wipe out all the inhabitants of the land. We've seen your god's power in Egypt and in the battles against Sihon King of Hesbon and Og king of Bashon, and Jericho and Ai. We are helpless against you militarily. We did the only thing we could think of to save our lives. We are in your hands. Do to us whatever seems good and right.

So Joshua saved them.

Note, God's command to wipe out the people of Canaan was so emphatic, so clear, so unmistakable, the pagan people had memorized it. There was nothing fuzzy or ambiguous or uncertain. God declared these people to be bad people, worthless people, people worthy of extermination!

The soldiers wanted to get on with their work. The Gibeonites lied their way into a peace treaty, but even that flimsy excuse was enough to set aside the explicit order of annihilation by God.

Many people in Canaan were killed as a result of God's instructions to wipe them out. But every time God is questioned, every time the killing order is questioned, mercy triumphs.

(The stories of Rahab and Ruth are dramatic examples of God-approved violations of the explicit commands to exterminate or exclude Canaanite people. In the case of Rahab, even though God had told Israel to annihilate every living thing in Jericho, Rahab was spared, and not only Rahab, but her entire clan and anybody else she could cram into her hotel. Ruth, contra Deuteronomy 23, is included in the Messianic lineage.)

The explicit condemnation of God, is set aside on the slightest pretext.

Joshua's soldiers could quote the exact words of God when they called for the annihilation of the Gibeonites. Joshua could only cite principle. (Generations later, when King Saul violated this treaty and slaughtered some Gibeonites, God sternly condemned his treachery.)

This story highlights the complications of a theology of violence. God authorized the violence--the genocide--against the Canaanites. Theologians justify this action by pointing to how utterly corrupt and debauched the Canaanites were. Their religion featured sexual immorality and the killing of children. It that's your religion, what do you do for sin?

But if the violence against the Canaanites was God's way of promoting goodness and righteousness, it didn't work. The books of Joshua and Judges show that once they finished practicing their violence, Israel sank into profound, deep darkness. The divinely-sanctioned violence apparently was completely ineffective, if the goal was the creation of a peaceful, harmonious society. 

Goliath posed an immediate problem. David eliminated the problem. He killed Goliath. Neither David personally, nor the nation lived happily ever. The killing of Goliath was one incident in a protracted, miserable, generations-long conflict. The elimination of Goliath was necessary. It was an emergency. It did not create the sweet, good world.

So how do we know God's will?

For starters, God's first choice is never death. Ezekiel 33:13-16. God is not looking for bad people to annihilate. He's looking for lost people to save. So should we.

God is willing to use violence. He does so repeatedly in the Bible. But with only a couple of exceptions, whenever condemnation is challenged, it is reversed or at least modified. This world is not a Hunger Games Stage where we thrive only by killing others. Rather, it is the opposite. We thrive as we move away from violence, away from condemnation, away from hatred.

God has articulated his highest will both negatively and positively.

Negatively: don't kill.

Positively: Love.

Sometimes violent action is necessary to protect others. My friend Jack did what he had to do. The special forces President Obama sent to rescue Captain Philip from pirates and the aid workers held hostage in Somalia had to use violence. I believe that violence is justified. But the need to use deadly force is a tragedy. It is the last resort. It is a declaration that the world has moved far from God's ideal.

A much better exhibition of the will of God are Jesus miracles of healing and his declarations of forgiveness and hope.

The work of healers—nurses, dentists, doctors, X-ray techs—these show us more of God.

The work of mothers. And teachers. And fathers. And uncles. And auto mechanics. And artists.

Those who enrich life and create beauty. These are the children of God he takes the greatest delight in.

Don't kill.

Enrich life.

That's really what God wants.