Opinion of this justification for the death penalty

[Kingpoleon]

I have never met someone who supported the death penalty yet was willing to give the lethal injection. The state kills in your name, and you support it? Christians ought to know that if even one person is killed in our name, and we are silent, then their blood shall testify against us - Deuteronomy 19, Psalm 94, Lamentations 4, and Proverbs 6. Vengeance is not for us, as Romans 12:19 and Deuteronomy 32:35 tell us, but for God.

The traditional Wesleyan interpretation of Romans 13 is as wrong now as ever. I am proud that the current Methodist church (UMC, at least) recognizes that the death penalty is as God tells His prophet Ezekiel: “I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live.” Is this not clear? I challenge the Christian who is without sin to shoot the first bullet and to initiate the first infection. We have been granted the means and the right to medically extend life and health to the fullest extent, but we may never, ever take life.

[Kingpoleon]

Again I ask: Do Ezekiel 18:23, 18:32 and 33:11 make God’s position on capital punishment unwavering and clear? Vengeance is for the Lord our God, and not for man. In the words of Coretta Scott King:

“As one whose husband and mother-in-law have died the victims of murder and assassination, I stand firmly and unequivocally opposed to the death penalty for those convicted of capital offenses. An evil deed is not redeemed by an evil deed of retaliation. Justice is never advanced in the taking of a human life. Morality is never upheld by a legalized murder."

[Kingpoleon]

I have never met someone who supported the death penalty yet was willing to give the lethal injection. The state kills in your name, and you support it? Christians ought to know that if even one person is killed in our name, and we are silent, then their blood shall testify against us - Deuteronomy 19, Psalm 94, Lamentations 4, and Proverbs 6. Vengeance is not for us, as Romans 12:19 and Deuteronomy 32:35 tell us, but for God.

The fact that capital punishment puts blood on our hands is an argument for it, not against it. When death penalty opponents hear of some unspeakable crime, their response is "lock him up and throw away the key" - out of site, out of mind. They don't want to acknowledge that evil exists, don't want to look at it. But when the state executes someone in our name, it puts the onus on us to recognize evil, our place in preventing it, and, yes, our place in punishing it.

God tells the prophet Ezekiel, not one time, not two times, but at least three times: “Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? ... Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?”

I know not your faith, but I know my own. The word of the Lord unto His prophets is law. I will answer unto Him if I have condemned a man to die, or if I am silent as he is executed. His bones shall condemn such actions, and his body shall denounce my very silence.