Vengeance is mine

I’ve been asked to expand on this post.

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2006/06/dancing-on-his-grave.html

One the one hand we have taunt-songs in Scripture. On the other hand, we have passages like Prov 24:17-18 or the Beatitudes.

So what should be the Christian attitude towards one’s enemies? A few distinctions are in order:

1.Enemies are not all of a kind. There’s the personal enemy who’s a royal pain in the neck. He tries to make your life a living hell. These are people in power, people with power over you, who abuse their power in petty and vindictive ways. Paradigm cases are the tyrannical drill sergeant and the obnoxious boss.

In this case, we’re supposed to return good for evil.

2.Then there’s the personal enemy who’s out to harm you in a more tangible and irreparable fashion. To do you violence. He is a threat to life, limb, and livelihood.

Here the principle of self-defense kicks in. You don’t fight back because you hate him. You fight back to protect yourself or your family from bodily harm or financial ruin.

3.Then there are powerful enemies of the faith like Jezebel, Athalia, and Julian the Apostate.

They are attempting to extirpate both the faith and the faithful. Once again, the principle of self-defense kicks in. The institution of the church is worth defending. Both the family and the church are essential in the economy of God.

4.There’s also an obvious difference between the living and the dead. Although a person’s eternal fate is sealed from eternity, only God knows for a fact who is elect or reprobate. So, from our perspective, where there’s life there’s hope.

But once an enemy is dead, he’s beyond the reach of prayer or evangelization. He’s squandered all his opportunities. All hope of repentance is gone.

5.For some odd reason, certain Christians infer that if private vengeance is forbidden in Scripture, then we should not rejoice over the demise of a notorious adversary.

But it’s precisely because vengeance is the Lord’s that we are entitled to rejoice in the Lord’s vengeance.

This is not directed at our enemies, but at our Lord. We praise God for his justice.

6.Equally illogical is when certain Christians infer that since we’re all sinners, none of us has the right to be judgmental.

But that’s fallacious. The truth is not that my enemy didn’t get his just deserts, but that I deserve the same fate.

We should not be self-righteous as we take satisfaction in the judgment of the ungodly. But that ought not hinder us from celebrating the fact that an evil man got his comeuppance.

We should rejoice in the wisdom of God’s mercy and God’s justice alike.