Romans 13:4

For he is a minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is a minister of God, an avenger of wrath to him that doeth evil.

The word rendered "he" in this verse could be translated "it"; but the translators are correct in making it personal, for only a person could be spoken of as bearing the sword. The person in view, therefore, is the policeman, the legally constituted arm of human government, making the law-enforcement men of cities, states, and nations to be every whir as much "ordained of God" as any minister of the gospel. A gutless namby-pambyism has come to characterize far too many Christians of this age, who naively and stupidly suppose that police departments are dispensable, that love can just take everything, and that our own enlightened (?) age does not need the old fashioned relics of barbarism, such as policemen and jails. Let all hear it from the word of God, if they are so blind as to be unable to read it in history, that the policeman also is God's man, and that without him there is nothing. The writer once invited two New York policemen into his living room, gave them a cup of coffee, and read this chapter to them, with the same exposition as here. Their astonishment and gratitude were nearly incredible. One of them reached for the New Testament to read it himself and said, "I do wish that everyone knew this." The other spoke up and said, "Well, it would help a lot if all the clergymen in our city knew it!" We say the same. Much of the vilification, harassment, and warring against policemen in the current era has blinded some good people to the absolute indispensability of governmental authority, including an effective police establishment.

Capital punishment is clearly allowed to be a legitimate prerogative of human government, by Paul's statements here. Those states which have yielded to the naive "do-gooder-ism" of the present era by abolishing the capital penalty will eventually pay the price of their foolishness. Present-day lawgivers are not wiser than God who laid down such penalties and enforced them in the Old Testament dispensation. True, the Decalogue says, "Thou shalt not kill" (Exodus 20:13); but the same God who said that also said, "Thou shalt surely kill him" (Numbers 15:35). These commandments do not nullify each other, because they speak of different things. Moffatt's translation made the difference clear, thus:

Thou shalt do no murder (Exodus 20:13).

The man must certainly be put to death (Numbers 15:35).

Moffatt took account of the essential difference in two Hebrew words, [~ratsach] and [~harag], the latter meaning "put to death," the other meaning "murder." Murder is, of course, forbidden; but the imposition of the death penalty by government is not forbidden. Humanity will never find a way to eliminate such a penalty completely, because it is the threat of death alone which enables policemen to apprehend and capture perpetrators of crime. Taking the gun out of the policeman's hands is the surest way to make all people victims of the lawless.