Heroes Kill Villains

God is merciful and compassionate, but not always. Sometimes it's evil to be merciful and wrath is called for instead. We tend to not think about this too much as we see God as the merciful One, but we need to also acknowledge that the devil inspires mercy and compassion in humans as much as God does. He just does it toward the wicked. He uses it as way to preserve his murderous agents. He's the villain telling the hero that the hero shouldn't stoop to his level and kill him or his minions. Afterall, heroes are merciful, right?

The story in 1 Samuel 15 is instructive here. Saul spares Agag the king, and a whole host of livestock and humans he desires to own, despite the fact that God told him to kill all of them. Now, one might say that his motives are not mercy but pride in that he desires to parade his captives as a way of flaunting his victory. However, built into the commands God gives for the death penalty is the command to not be merciful toward those who are wicked and under God's judgment. Regardless of the motives, to spare the wicked when they should be destroyed is mercy.

In Deuteronomy 7:2, God says, "and when the LORD your God gives them over to you, and you defeat them, then you must devote them to complete destruction. You shall make no covenant with them and show no mercy to them."

It is clear that to show mercy upon the wicked is wicked. But why? Because to show mercy upon the wicked by sparing their lives is to treat their evil as benign and to unjustly oppress the innocent. It is to lift up the wicked as deserving of honor and the innocent as less than worthy to receive honor. It is to favor the wicked over the righteous. Furthermore, to spare the wicked is to join with them in their shedding of innocent blood and oppressing those upon whom they prey. God, being just, desires to show wrath to the wicked, not mercy, and for anyone claiming to represent God to show the opposite of what God desires to show is himself a false prophet, a murderer, and deserves death himself, which is what the passage goes on to say. 

By sparing Agag, Saul was not only communicating the opposite of God's desires toward the wicked, he was joining with them and their future generations in killing and oppressing the innocent.

Mercy is for the repentant, those who throw off their roles as destroyers and seek to be givers of life through the Lord Jesus Christ. Wrath is for the wicked who have solidified themselves in the role of the destroyer. Hence, to show mercy to the wicked is a satanic, not a Christ-like characteristic of our modern society.

When leniency is given to violent criminals, it is a great injustice and the display of a worthless leadership. The more the implementation of our laws reflect a mercy upon criminals, the more they inflict crimes upon the innocent and show themselves to be satanic in nature. Hence, God's wrath is toward, not only the doers of wicked deeds, but upon those who would give no justice to the innocent victims and enable the wicked to victimize more of the innocent in the future. 

All of them should be rounded up, and once it is determined through a court of law that they are guilty, executed swiftly. But that seems cold and harsh to our culture. In the modern mind, it's much more peaceful and merciful to let them run rampant to kill, beat, rob, and rape the innocent. Hence, the wrath of God will fall, as it did upon the Canaanites, upon the whole of the current leadership and every so-called Christian calling for leniency upon the wicked. 

The good and righteous God is the Destroyer of destroyers because He is the Giver of Life. Those who would follow Him will do the same. Those who enable the destroyers are simply making the devil's argument but all who know the truth know this truth: heroes kill villains.