The Bible, Sin, and Civil Punishment

The conversation goes like this:

“Do you believe every word of the Bible?”

“Yes,” you answer.

“Do you believe what the Bible says about sin?”

Again, you answer, “Yes.”

Then comes the question of all questions: “Do you believe that adulterers and adulteresses should be put to death per Leviticus 20:20-12; homosexuals per Leviticus 20:13; false prophets per Deuteronomy 18:20; or someone involved in the occult per Exodus 22:18?”

How do you respond?  What do you say? 

You can’t deny the meaning of the verses; they clearly state that the punishment for these sins (and many others) is death.

WHAT YOU SHOULDN’T SAY

You dare not play the “God is more gracious in the New Testament” card.  By suggesting that God is more gracious in the New Testament but more vengeful in the Old Testament is to suggest that God has changed – something He is incapable of doing.  No, make no mistake: God is as gracious in the Old Testament as He is in the New Testament, and He is as vengeful in the New Testament as He is in the Old Testament.  The answer to this difficult question doesn’t lie in God’s disposition changing from the Old Testament to the New Testament.

WHAT YOU MUST UNDERSTAND

To properly answer the question, one must consider the entire storyline of the Bible. 

First, one must consider why sin in the Old Testament was punished as a crime.  In the Old Testament the people of God constituted a nation, Israel.  For a person to be considered a part of God’s people, he had to be a citizen of Israel.  Like any nation, Israel had laws that had to be obeyed.  The law that governed Israel was the Law God gave to Moses on Mt. Sinai.  Thus, for Israel, there was no distinction between civil law and spiritual law.  Because of this, when an Israelite disobeyed the Law, they were not only guilty of sinning against God, but they were also guilty of sinning against the state; therefore, sin in the Old Testament was punished as a crime, not just a sin.

Second, in the New Testament, the people of God, the church, no longer constitute a nation.  The church is a multi-national body made up of believers from all nations.  A person no longer needs to be a citizen of a particular nation (Israel) in order to be a member of the church; a person becomes a member of the church by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. 

Third, because the church is not a civil government, sin are dealt with by exhortation, or, in some cases, exclusion from membership.  When a man in the Corinthian church was committing adultery with his father’s wife (1 Corinthians 5:1-8), Paul does not instruct the church to execute the adulterer and adulteress although that is what Leviticus 20:10 calls for; rather, he instructs the church to excommunicate them, to exclude them from the fellowship of the church.  Paul was not ignoring Leviticus 20:10; he understood that the church does not have the authority to carry out civil punishment on sin.  The church’s authority is seen in discipline (in hopes of restoration).

Fourth, there are times when civil law and biblical law intersect.  For instance, the Bible says “You shall not commit murder,” and most civil governments have laws making murder a crime punishable by life in prison or execution. 

HOW TO ANSWER THE QUESTION

Back to the conversation at the beginning of this article. 

What do you say to someone who says, ““Do you believe that adulterers and adulteresses should be put to death per Leviticus 20:20-12; homosexuals per Leviticus 20:13; false prophets per Deuteronomy 18:20; or someone involved in the occult per Exodus 22:18?”

You should respond by saying that, while you still believe each act is a sin, you do not believe someone should be put to death for these sins because the church is not a civil government with the authority to carry out civil punishment. 

Since sin in the New Testament is not punished as a civil crime, one dare assume that sin goes unpunished.  All sin will be punished eventually.  All sin will be punished ultimately.  All sin will be punished eternally.  Revelation 21:8 says, “But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

All sin will be punished in one of two places – either in the body of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross or in Hell.