Praying for Rapists: Justice or Salvation?

Rape is one of the clearest embodiments of evil that we have seen in many years. The very existence of rape culture is a mockery of the so-called civilised society. Rapists prey on the innocent, including children. There’s no question that rape is a menace that deserves the fiercest punishment. 
Over the last few days, many of us watched with horror and heartbreak as reports of child rapes and murders were reported in different parts of the country. Large crowds of people came out to protest in one voice against the barbaric crimes and demanded death penalty for the criminals who had raped and murdered an 8-year-old shepherd girl. 
But is justice the only thing that Christians should pray for when it comes to rape and murder? Should we pray for a Saul among those murderers or a David among those rapists whose salvation might shock and change his community upside down with the Gospel? 
These are not contradictory prayers, and to each of them I say, “Amen.” 

Justice and Justification 

Jesus says to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us (Matt. 5:44). The Spirit of Jesus in the prophets and in the apostles also tells us that those who turn a blind eye to the killing (and rape) of others are wrong.
The reason we find it contradictory to pray for both justice against rape and salvation for the rapists is partly because we fail to distinguish between the mission of the government in the use of the temporal sword against evildoers (Rom. 13:4) and the mission of the church in the use of the sword of the Spirit against sin and death and the devil (Eph. 6). But that’s not, I think, the main problem. 
The main problem is that we sometimes forget that we are called to be a people of both justice and justification – and that these two aren’t contradictory. 
To not pray for swift action against them is to not care about what Jesus said we should seek – that we should hunger and thirst for justice. A world in which murderous gangs commit rape and murder without penalty is not a ‘merciful’ world but an unjust horror show. 
As Christians we ought to be, above all people, concerned with social justice. 

Gospel and Punishment 

At the same time, praying for the salvation of our enemies, even those committing the most horrific of crimes, isn’t a call to stop praying for justice against them. The cross, after all, is not forgiveness in a therapeutic sense, in which one is merely absolved of wrongdoing as though it were all a misunderstanding. 
The Gospel does not say, “Don’t worry about it; it’s okay.” The Gospel points us to the cross where sin is absorbed in a substitute. God’s righteous condemnation of sin is there. God’s justice cannot and will not enable wickedness. And God’s mercy is also there in that He is the One who sends His Son as the propitiation for sin. He is both “just and the justifier of the One who has faith in Jesus” (Rom. 3:26). At the cross, God’s justice and His mercy collide. 
The Gospel doesn’t leave sin unpunished. Every sin is punished – either at the cross, in Christ or in the judgment of hell, on one’s own. 
The repentant thief on the cross did not believe his salvation exempted him from justice. He confessed that his punishment was just, that he was receiving “the due reward for [his] deeds” (Luke 23:41) even as he cried out to Jesus for merciful entrance into His kingdom (Luke 23:42). 
We ought, indeed, to pray for the Gospel to go forward, and that there may be a changed Saul or a changed David or a changed thief on the cross. 
At the same time we ought to pray, remembering the victims, for justice against those who perpetrate wickedness. Praying for God’s justice over perpetrators – and that they may turn to Christ – aren’t contradictory prayers, because salvation doesn’t mean turning an eye away from justice. 
We are, after all, the people of the cross where justice and mercy meet. 
Note: This article is inspired by, and adapted from, Russell Moore’s article in TGC. 
Contributed by Joy Shekyna
A dentist working in a Gospel-mission clinic. Cheers for second chances and life for those on the margins. Loves reading at odd hours and cleaning the odd places. In her free time, you will find her clearing space on her phone.