Capital Punishment, Gen 9:6-7

Capital Punishment

Gen 9:6-7

The Marathon bombing trial is over except for the last part of the sentencing phase. Many people have been surprised that the death penalty was decided by the jury in liberal Massachusetts. The date for the pronouncement has been set. It is a foregone conclusion. Yet, officials expect a lot of protest. All that needs to be decided are the place, means and time of death, well except for the many appeals that may ensue.

There was something about this particular case that grabbed the consciences of many. The crime was so calloused and heinous that many anti-death penalty advocates were willing to look the other way. Reason won over emotional arguments. That is a good thing for society--our society.

In this time between the trial and final sentencing, I want to take today's sermon and search out some important truths about life, death and the death penalty. Perhaps, there will be something helpful for you to use as you engage in conversation with others. I have discovered that not many believers know why God gave the death penalty--that is why murder is a capital crime. 

My outline for the day is:

1. The Origin of Capitol Punishment

2. The Reason for Capitol Punishment

3. The Legacy and Place of Capitol Punishment today

We will be mainly in the book of Genesis for the first part of the message.

1. The Origin of Capitol Punishment

As we start in Genesis 1, we find man created in a different category than the rest of creation. Man was made in the image of God. It is proper to speak of this phenomena in those terms or to say man is the image of God on earth. The difference in those two expressions is minimal in reality.

26 Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."

27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. They are above the animals and creeping things, yet,  a little lower than the angels. All human beings descending from Adam and Eve and then from Noah, after the fall, have the image of God upon them.

That image is primarily the ability to reason and to show forth to the creation what we call the communicable attributes of God-that is those characteristics of God that are also found in mankind: rationality & truth, love, mercy, grace and the like. These are contrasted with the attributes that make God uniquely divine. The incommunicable attributes are those we can begin to understand in our minds, but that we will never have or fully know as God does like immensity, infinity, aseity, holy, and others.

Those attributes or characters that can be communicated to human creatures are what make up the image of God. Well, there is one more--the ability to rule or direct the creation for God. This is part of the reation mandate--to be fruitful and multiply. We find that phrase many times in the book of Genesis alone. We find it in the next verse as the image-bearers are given a couple of important commands:

 28 God blessed them. And God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth."

They were to rule, under God, as his vice-gerents, the living things that God had made. He gave them dominion or lordship over the earth and whatever populated it. Why should we be concerned with  being stewards of what is called nature? Because God has given it to mankind in perpetuity to do so.

                                                                                     

Yet, sin entered the world and changed a number of things. One of the changes was a penalty of eventual death for capital offenses or crimes.

At the beginning, every sin, that is every act that did not conform to God's commands in commission or omission would be considered a sin.

Adam and Eve were free to do whatever they needed to do to fulfill the mandate given to them by God. Only one thing was prohibited: 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die."

This is the origin of the death penalty. If you take and eat of this special tree, you will surely die. Clear? And, Adam and Eve knew which tree this was. When they sinned, they did so knowingly. Well, Eve was deceived and she passed the fruit on to Adam, who should have known the fruit was from the tree God prohibited. He took, he ate, he received the sentence of eventual death. I say eventual, because the sentence was pronounced on the same day, but his physical death came much later.

There is a death that is worse than physical, it is spiritual. Adam received this sentence of death: his fellowship with God was broken, he was now ashamed of his nakedness in the presence of his wife, God provided a covering from the animals in the garden, Adam was cast from the garden and his sin was imputed to all who would descend from him by natural descent. In other words, all men and women are born with this death sentence on their account. This is why the Bible says, "22 For as in Adam all die…. But we are not left there. All those found to be in ADAM will surely die,  ….so also in Christ shall all be made alive. All who are found to be in Christ will live. That's the hope for the end of the story.

2. The Reason for Capital Punishmen

Even though, everyone has the sentence of death pronounced on them and it lies recorded in their records in heaven and we are also told in Eph 1 that all men and women are already dead in trespasses and sins even though we are out and about walking around. They have bad hearts and a bad record.

Turn over to Gen 9: 6 "Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, 

These words are often quoted by the death penalty advocates. What is in view here, is the idea of retribution one life for another. Someone takes a life, his or her life should also be taken. As societies develop, and settle down in various places, the quick sentence of death becomes important. And, the system progresses to the importance of and the use of witnesses, safe places for the accused to go and much more. But, with the develop of these realities in societies generally and from the Scriptures in particular, there is an important element in all of this that is missing today. Missing even among my many Christian friends who have voiced their opinions online.

Back in antiquity, a man was not put to death only because he had taken the life of another--that was part of it. A man was not put to death as a deterent to others. Based on the words in

Gen 9:6b the compound reason was a life for a life, but also …for God made man in his own image. …The image of God had been removed from the earth. Every murder reversed God's supreme command to his image-bearers. The main reason why any type of deliberate life-taking is wrong is this: it is an attack on God and his image--regardless of who they are--because each and every man and women on the face of this earth bears the image of God. We may not like to think of that as true when we consider cultures so contrary to God's truth and his people. But, it is. All mankind has dignity not because of elements of their fallen cultures, but because they are the image-bearers of God. 

The passage in Chapter 9 of Genesis reads….

7 And you, be fruitful and multiply, teem on the earth and multiply in it."

That is all the earth. All who would take the life of an image-bearer of God, including themselves, are murderers. This is what Jesus says about them: John 8: 44 You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

Not all taking of a life is murder. Not all killing is a breaking of the commandment--you shall not kill.

Capital punishment is not murder if it is absolutely certain the person put to death is the one who committed the crime.

In Ireland, in 1940, there was a case where a woman who had seven children out of wedlock by as many different men, was shot in the face and killed. A man named Harry Gleason had been out walking early in the morning on the farm where he labored. The farm was called "Marlhill." This woman, Moll Carthy. Had named each child after its father, though nobody knew it at the time, except for the father of each child. When the police investigated the crime, the intimidated a number of witnesses, including Harry Gleason's fellow farmhand and roommate. Hary was found guilty in a rush to judgment and hung in Dublin. He was someone hardly anybody knew--so he was indispensible to the justice system. He was a farmhand from a little out of the way place called New Inn. Harry was hung in 1940. Soon thereafter, authorities started questioning his execution. Just this year, 75 years later, his sentence was changed because of some "new" evidence. All of those involved in the case were dead or ancient. His former roommate left a note giving Harry an alibi. This is the reason the police beat him up in the first place. His roommate, Tommy Reid left the note in the ceiling of the home in which he died in the early 90s. This case, the Murder at Marlhill, was the main reason Ireland made the death penalty illegal--they did not want to put any more innocent men to death. 

The potentiality of making a mistake in and particular case is not enough to actually make it illegal universally.

Can people still be mistaken? Yes, but that is why the process needs to be open and honest and the legal helpers must be after the truth, not just their choice verdict. What is decided in any one case or even a couple of cases can have effects on the culture at learge and what comes to be believed in culture also influences some in the church.

As Christians, our question should be did this person kill others removing the image of God from the face of the earth? Are we absolutely sure? On the face of 2 or 3 witnesses these things can be established. With the tools available to us in the modern world, we have many more and diverse witness available to us in order to get it right.

3. The Legacy and Place of Capital Punishment today

The greatest injustice comes to the death penalty is not Harry Gleason, it is the Lord Jesus Christ himself. But, you don't hear the high courts using him as the example--if there were ever one, it is He.

The night Jesus was betrayed, he was taken away to stand four trials: two by the Jews and two by the Romans. There were dozens of eyewitnesses to his ministry. He was being tried on sedition charges--he was viewed as a revolutionary undermining the Jewish way and the rule of the Romans. Yet, Pilate the Roman Procurator washed his hands of the whole matter partially due to a dream his wife had had.

The jews insited upon his death. But, the Jewish Law did not allow them to so close to the Passover. They technically could have stoned him for blasphemy in the days before, and they sought to, but Jesus was able to disappear by walking through their midst. After, the four illegal trials, and at the insistence of the Jews, the Romans seized in order to put Jesus to death by crucifixion.

Have you ever thought of Jesus death as an injustice and a case of an unjust death penalty?

Listen to Peter's sermon 50 days after the death of Jesus to the same feast-going crowd in Jerusalem, In the Second Chapter of Acts, sting in verse 22, we read: 22 Ye men of Israel, hear these words;Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you bymiracles and wonders and signs, which God did by him inthe midst of you, as ye yourselves also know : 23 Him,being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken,and by wickedhands have crucified and slain : 

That is the greatest injustice perpetrated among mankind--an innocent man who was also the holy Lord of Glory was taken by wicked hands and murdered.

These people were there, they knew  what had happened. They were among those who cried out for the crucifixion of Jesus and a week before that they wanted Him as their king.  But, the scriptures by inspiritation of the Spirit of God tells us that God was behind it all letting it develop, letting come to pass for a greater good--the salvation of sinners.

Jesus was delivered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge and God, yet it was the plotting of sinners--wicked men--who put him to death. The divine judicial use of a human injustice in order to bring about the greatest good humans will even experience.  Peter continued:

24 Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be held by it.

When your friends and acquaintances complain about what an injustice the death penalty can be--tell them about Jesus. Tell them he had four trials. Tell them he was railroaded by his own people. Thell them of the injustice to a holy being who willingly took it upon himself to suffer for the sin of his people.

The injustice of Jesus's death is so much worse than the injustice of Harry Gleason's death.

The death penalty was never rescinded by God. The worst thing a human can do to another is still to remove the image of God from the earth.

There are time when taking a life is justified: self-defense or in the defense of others, in just wars, n government declarations--they are given the sword by God to encourage the good and punish those who do wrong.

Did I say punish? The death penalty is not intended to be a deterant to crime, though that is the argument that is usually given in the negative--that it is not a good deterant for crime. The death penalty is simply a punishment from the state--that's all.

That is it's legacy. Whenever it is used, it should not bring us delight, but remind us--but by the grace of God, go the rest of us.

Rom 13

1 Pet 2