Tag Archives: Genesis

Crime and Punishment

February 3, 2010

Let’s say you wake up tomorrow morning and discover that some time in the night all of your valuables have been stolen.  You call the police and fill out a report.  Two days later, the cops catch the thief and are able to return some but not all of your things.  At this point, what do you expect should happen to the thief?  In most states, he will go to jail or prison, and the sentence length is based on what the value of the property stolen happened to be and whether his theft can be counted as a misdemeanor or a felony.

But is this what should happen?  In America, we witness so many cases where the punishment does not fit the crime that the grand majority of us don’t even know that there might be a problem.  We see it on the news when drug lords are put away for life.  We see it in television shows like 24 when Jack Bauer does inhumane things in pursuit of the next lead – we even applaud it!  We especially see it in the way that our laws have no punishments for evil acts like aborting unborn children, participating in homosexual acts, practicing witchcraft, or bowing down to false gods.

God’s Law, as revealed in His Word, contains appropriate and fitting punishments for transgressions of that Law.  The thief is not incarcerated; he is merely forced to either return what was stolen and/or pay back two to five times the value of what he took, depending on the circumstance (Exodus 22:1-4).  That’s a punishment that fits the crime.  The victim actually ends up in a better place than he was before his property was stolen – something that never happens in our criminal justice system – and the thief has to do some hard work to make right his wrong, but he does not have years stolen from his life in incarceration.  Both sides are “happy” with this outcome.

On the other end of the spectrum, if someone has committed murder or adultery or practiced witchcraft, that person’s life is forfeit immediately on the basis of two or more witnesses (Exodus 21:12, Deuteronomy 22:22, and Exodus 22:18 respectively).  There are no life sentences or paroles.  The punishment fits the crime.  In our society, some crimes are punished far too harshly, and some abominable crimes are not punished at all, or else they receive such measly consequences that it becomes a joke.

I found myself recently swept up in the cultural delusion concerning just punishment when I read Genesis 34.  In the story, Jacob’s daughter, Dinah, is raped by Shechem the son of Hamor the Hittite.  Dinah’s brothers are, of course, furious over this, and so two of them, Simeon and Levi, concoct a very Jack Bauer-like plan to have every male in the town circumcised.  Then, on the third day, when all of the men are so sore that they can’t even get up, these two brothers come through and put the whole city to the sword.  I’ve seen enough TV that I actually applaud this kind of commando behavior.

Jacob was not very impressed with his sons’ vengeance, however.  At first, he rebukes Simeon and Levi for causing him to “stink to the inhabitants of the land” (Genesis 34:30).  He is concerned that the rest of the people of the surrounding area might attack him.  But at the end of Jacob’s life, he hands out an even sterner criticism of the boys’ actions during the “blessing” of his twelve sons.  He says in Genesis 49:5-7:

Simeon and Levi are brothers; weapons of violence are their swords.  Let my soul come not into their council; O my glory, be not joined to their company.  For in their anger they killed men, and in their willfulness they hamstrung oxen.  Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce, and their wrath, for it is cruel!  I will divide them in Jacob and scatter them in Israel.

This is how we ought to think about what the boys did.  Killing an entire town was not a just punishment for the actions of one man – it was mass murder!  In fact, not even the rapist should have been put to the sword; even that punishment would not have fit the crime.  Later, the Law would say, “If a man seduces a virgin who is not engaged to be married and lies with her, he shall give the bride-price for her and make her his wife.  If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money equal to the bride-price for virgins” (Exodus 22:16-17).  This is exactly what Shechem tried to do (Genesis 34:12).

Our understanding of what punishment a crime ought to deserve needs to come from a reading of God’s Law, not our own feelings.  This is just one more place in our culture where we have replaced the Word of God with the whim of man.

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Mind Boggling

February 2, 2010

Jonathan Edwards once said, “Absolute sovereignty is what I love to ascribe to God.”

Many years ago, when I first read those words cited in John Piper’s Desiring God, they struck an instant chord in my soul.  This was what made God so incredibly great in my mind: He was in control of absolutely everything.  And when I let my mind start tracing the sequence of causes and effects that lead up to any single event, I am astounded with wonder at the amazing God I serve who can work all things out to His desired ends.

Almost nowhere in the Bible is this more clearly seen than in the story of Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Egypt, and the Exodus.  Just fifteen chapters into the Bible, God promises Abraham that his descendants will dwell in the land of his sojourning (Canaan), but the promise doesn’t end there.  He also says that before that happens, Abraham’s descendants will spend four hundred years in a land that is not their own.  And the reason that God gives for this delay?  Because “the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.”

So Abraham has no idea how all of this is going to work out, and neither does anyone else.  But one day, Abraham’s grandson, Jacob, ends up favoring one of his sons over the others – an affection that leads ten of the brothers to sell Joseph into slavery because of their jealousy.  While enslaved, this Joseph is falsely accused of adultery by his master’s wife and ends up in prison.  While in prison, he meets a couple of Pharaoh’s staff members who dream some interesting dreams.  God then gives Joseph the interpretation of their dreams which – two years later – leads to Joseph having an opportunity to interpret Pharaoh’s dream of a coming famine.

So God sent a famine on the whole earth, but he sent seven years of plenty first.  And He sent the warning in a dream to Pharaoh, whose cup-bearer remembered the dream-interpreter from the prison.  Therefore, it ends up being this great-grandson of Abraham who is set up to save the world from the seven years of blight by storing up the surplus from the seven years of plenty.  In the process, the family of Jacob is affected by the famine also and has to come to Egypt for food, where they eventually get reacquainted with their brother and end up moving the whole family.

This leads directly to the promised four hundred years of captivity, a situation that causes the Israelites to be forged into a mighty nation.  And it is from this situation that God leads leads His people out with many signs and wonders, creating for them a story of rescue and salvation that becomes the central narrative of their entire existence as a people.  It is an event also that leaves the nation of Israel with a great deal of wealth, as God promised Abraham – a wealth that they will need when God gives them the design for the tabernacle.

And so, when this mighty nation reaches the borders of the Promised Land, they are then set to bring the judgment of God upon the completed iniquity of the Amorites (Genesis 15:16), acting as God’s sword against that sin even as they are fulfilling an age old promise of blessing to their forefather Abraham.  And God has masterfully orchestrated the whole thing to declare His glory: the glory of His justice in punishing the sin of the Amorites, which did not go unchecked; the glory of His grace is saving an unworthy people; the glory of His faithfulness in fulfilling His promises; and the glory of His sovereign will in revealing the sweeping scope of this plan to readers of His Word.

Absolute sovereignty is what I love to ascribe to God because a God who rules His creation like this is so different from the false gods that those in world and even some in the church try to craft for themselves.  Their gods that react to situations in the world rather than cause them are weak and powerless wimps and utterly unworthy of worship.  But the God who has revealed Himself in the Bible – the God who has revealed Himself in Jesus Christ – is the majestic Creator, Ruler, Sustainer, and Sovereign King over everything.  Nothing can thwart His will (Job 42:2), and He does all that He pleases (Psalm 115:3).  He guides everything to the end that He has planned, and He is worthy of worship.

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Five Times Fair

February 1, 2010

“My God wouldn’t do such a thing!  He loves everybody equally!”

“I just can’t believe that!  That’s not fair!”

These exact phrases have been spoken by Christians in response to the biblical teaching of God’s unconditional election (Ephesians 1:3-14, Acts 13:48, John 6:37,44, et.al.) and in response to the biblical teaching that God gifts individual Christians with differing amounts of faith and gifts (Romans 12:3-8).  What lies at the heart of these complaints is the idea that God must treat all human beings equally or else He is not a good God.

Strangely enough, this same sentiment does not rear its ugly head when the Bible presents us with a human story of unbalanced blessings.  For example, no one seems to have any problem with Joseph’s lack of “fairness” in Genesis 43 and 45 when he gives his younger brother Benjamin a portion of food at dinner that is five times greater than what his older brothers receive, or when he gives Benjamin five changes of clothes and 300 shekels of silver and the older brothers receive no silver and only one change of clothes.  In fact, if you were to ask the same people making the complaints above whether or not Joseph had the right to do this, they would say, “Of course he does!”  Why is that?

The reasons behind Joseph’s right to give unequal treatment are that 1) he is the owner of the goods being distributed, and therefore he can do with them whatever he likes; 2) he has all the power in Egypt and his brothers have none, so he has every right to do whatever he wants concerning them and they have no legal right to demand otherwise; and 3) Joseph is the one who has been wronged by the brothers – they sold him into slavery and are now literally at his mercy.

In other words, the reasons why someone would believe that Joseph had every right to give any sort of unequal treatment that he wanted are the exact same reasons that ought to lead us to understand that God has that same right.  He is the Creator and thus the owner of every single particle in this universe (or any other).  You are made up of His stuff.  You breathe His air, walk on His earth, eat His produce, and on and on we could go.  Also, He has all power and authority in the universe.  This comes from the fact that He created it, but also because He is the greatest and most powerful of all beings.  We literally have no legal right to appeal any of His decisions.  He is the absolute Sovereign King and we are nothing (Isaiah 40:17).  Lastly, He has been wronged by man.  From the very beginning, He gave His Law (which He as Sovereign Master had every right to give, and which man as lowly creature had every obligation to obey) and man broke it.  And from that point on, all human beings have been steeped in sin – disobedience to the Law of God.  Therefore, man is at every moment living completely on God’s mercy, without any hope in himself.

So when someone complains that the biblical doctrine of election or the biblical teaching of unequal gifts is unfair, then what is really happening is that such a person has forfeited one of the points above.  Either that person does not believe that God owns everything, does not believe that God has all authority, or does not believe that man has wronged God in some way.  Because the proper response of one who has wronged the Almighty Creator and Ruler of the universe is absolute submission to anything He desires to do.  We must leave the heretical idea of entitlement in hell where it belongs.

Are you a Christian?  Then rejoice that your name is written in the Lamb’s Book of Life from the foundation of the earth (Luke 10:20, Revelation 13:8).  It’s okay to thank and praise God for choosing to save a “wretch like me”.  That kind of praise leaves all boasting at the door, because you’re thanking God for what He did, not what you did.  He doesn’t save us because we’re worthy of it – far from it – He saves us because He wants to.  His reasons are His own.  And He gifts us to fulfill the role that He has designed for us.  And far from being jealous, we ought to learn to rejoice with those that God has chosen to bless more than us, because they are just as unworthy of those blessings as we are, and so we rejoice at what God is doing through them because it is His work.

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