Mercy on His Soul – Judgment on His Body

Last updated on: May 18, 2015 at 6:25 pm by John Mark N. Reynolds

Mercy on His Soul – Judgment on His Body 2015-05-18T18:25:38-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

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Americans fantasize that we live in an nonjudgmental age or at the very least we (almost) universally judge the judgmental as lacking in social justice. The reality is that our judgment has grown uncertain in areas where we should be sure and sure in places where it should be uncertain. We are confused about whether to celebrate the birth of a girl by saying: “It’s a girl!” lest we cause offense, but positive certain people have passed beyond redemption.

Nobody has passed beyond redemption.

This deserves justice. We will show mercy in doing justice.

A terrorist was convicted in Boston of a horrible murder. There are American voices unsure who to blame (society? religion? his brother?) thus stripping this adult of his free will before God. Ultimately, we honor this man as a man by saying plainly: He came. He saw. He murdered. He is unrepentant. A court has convicted to be taken to a place of judgment to be executed.

May the Lord God have mercy on his soul.

There is a legitimate debate for Christians about the justice of the death penalty in a wealthy society. Unlike nomadic peoples or poor nations, we can afford a prison system where this murderer can pay for his crimes for a lifetime. Yet this man expresses no remorse for his crime and would present a hazard to the guards and the other prisoners. He would never be safe himself in prison no matter what actions America took.

That is not the uncertainty that should concern us. No Christian ever rejoices in the death of a man, though the murderer may have to die. If we must go to war or impose death as a penalty, and sometimes we must, it is not a thing for which we have joy.

A state of Christians can ethically execute this man for his crimes, but no Christian can hate him. This is a man and he is not beyond redemption. Good can come of his story yet . . . and I am commanded to love him even though he is my enemy. This marks a chief difference between Christian ethics and almost every other system: religious or non-religious. We must love our enemies.

Justice is good and the state will do justice, but it is the measure of a Christian that he shows mercy to the individual. What difference does this make? On one practical level: none. The murderer will die and the fact that we will throw no parties, not torture him, and give him a death far more merciful than he gave his victims will make him no less dead. We will not deface his corpse or as Achilles did to Hector drag his body around the streets of Boston.

He will be dead and so he will not care.

And yet American society should care, because Boston, mostly inhabited by Christians (though this is fading) is inhibited in vengeance. We can trust that kind of city to try crimes, even heinous crimes like this bombing, because they are not motivated by revenge. If America ever changes and asks a juror to do vengeance, then no Christian will sit on a jury again. We will be unable to do so. Justice we can exact, but never vengeance. That is God’s job and His judgment is slow and takes trillions of variables into account. It is a mystery to us, but reason and experience has shown God to be good.

The murderer should care as well. We will give him his rights, more than any society he advocates would give us. We let Goering attack American lawyers at Nuremberg and we will let this poor excuse for a terrorist do the same. He will be well fed, get better medicine than most of the world receives, and be kept as safe as we can keep him. He will have a chance to give his story, defending himself with lawyers we will provide. He can give us the finger on camera again and again. We will watch and we will pray and we will not hate.

We will give him a man’s death and then bury him like a man leaving the judgment of his poor soul to God. We will pray he finds more mercy there than he gave his victims. And in doing all of this, we will have gone the first step in mitigating his evil in a wave of good. We will exemplify to the world that love is not weak: justice will be done, but without rancor or anger.

Avoid the talk-radio snark or easy condemnations. We deplore the dead, we condemn the murderer, and we pray for the soul of the man.

Best for all of us this means nobody is beyond the pale of forgiveness. No man is just a dog to be shot in the street. No criminal, not even the thugs of ISIS or the Third Reich, are just taken to the wall and shot. Christians in America, at our best, know these truths and we pray this terrorist repent and avoid the eternal hell that awaits his soul if he does not. For him, for all of us, the world might say we are beyond hope of redemption or Paradise, but God says “no.” There is still time. He can repent and the Lord God will have mercy on his soul.

Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

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