As a Christian, I believe that God created the world and ordered it a certain way. And when people live in accord with that order, things go better than when they don’t. And as a pastor who really believes what his Bible says, I do not believe that “be nice” is the only thing I can learn from Christianity. I believe the Bible all the way down. And that means that I believe what it says about human governance and how that affects our behavior as a society.
And in this moment, in real time, we are seeing what happens when a government decides to take its God-given role more seriously. I’m not saying our government is perfect. You won’t catch me ever saying that. But I am saying that the movement toward what it’s supposed to do is showing real results right now. And everyone is having to take notice.
Sharp Decrease In Violent Crime
Violent crime is in a nosedive right now. And folks are trying to figure out why. And I’m sure that you’re all shocked when I say that most are desperately trying to figure out how to not give the orange man any credit.
Check out what ABC News had to say about it. The article tries to pinpoint reasons other than the biblical one, but they just can’t get away from the data. You can read the whole article here.
Data collected from 35 American cities showed a 21% decrease in the homicide rate from 2024 to 2025, translating to about 922 fewer homicides last year, according to a new report from the independent Council on Criminal Justice.
The report, released on Thursday, tracked 13 crimes and recorded drops last year in 11 of those categories including carjackings, shoplifting, aggravated assaults and others. Drug crimes saw a small increase over last year and sexual assaults stayed even between 2024 and 2025, the study found.
And, as far as murder goes, it’s the steepest drop on record.
So, the sharp decrease nationwide is happening. But why?
Because Government Decided To Do What It’s Supposed To Do
Crime has been trending downward in some of these cities for a couple years. The steep decline is new. But even the downward trend is explained by Romans 13.
Covid 19’s appearance in the year 2020 was a disruption to most things here in America. But it wasn’t really the virus that did the disrupting, it was the government response to the virus. As it turns out, when you incentivize bad behavior you get more bad behavior. In this case the bad behavior was getting paid not to work. Getting paid not to work didn’t make people’s lives better, depression and suicide rose dramatically.
This coincided with the “Summer of Love”. You remember it. “Mostly peaceful protests” where whole city blocks were burned and looted were allowed to take place while people were being told they couldn’t even outside to work.
In 2020 bad behavior was incentivized and good behavior was penalized.
As we’ve moved away from 2020, slowly some things have gotten better. People are going back to work and crime has slowly been on the decline. Bad behavior is not being rewarded. Looters and rioters are not roaming and terrorizing the streets. Now that the “mostly peaceful protests” are over, they’re not happening. And people now have to work to make ends meet. This all makes sense.
But the sharp decrease this year is due to an additional piece of the puzzle being put in place. In some cities we’re talking about historically low murder rates. In some cities it’s the lowest murder rate since 1900.
The answer to this is enforcement of laws. It’s that evildoers are now being punished more swiftly than they have in a long time. The answer is that good behavior is being rewarded and bad behavior is being punished.
That is what government is supposed to do. it is supposed to punish the evildoer and reward good behavior. Notice what Paul said in Romans 13:1-7.
“Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer. Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God’s wrath but also for the sake of conscience. For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.”
Romans 13:1-7 ESV
The most basic role of government is to be a terror to bad behavior. They are to strike fear in those that would do evil. And now that this is happening, bad behavior is on the decline.
The National Guard and ICE
There is much happening at the federal level to accomplish this. And it’s always being met with sneers from the left.
Do you remember how controversial sending the National Guard into crime ridden cities was just a few months ago?
Illinois, Oregon, and California filed lawsuits and won concerning this usage of the National Guard. But not everyone wanted the National Guard out.
Even NPR, which despises Trump, has had to admit that the National Guard lowered crime rates in Washington DC. And closer to me, Memphis has also seen a dramatic decrease in crime since the National Guard came to town. I have avoided America’s homicide capitol for a while, but now that it’s safer I’d like to take a trip that way.
This just makes sense. People are less likely to commit crime if they will be punished for it than when they will not.
Why did parades of people loot stores and burn down cities in 2020?
Because they could without repercussions.
Why are people not doing that now?
Because governing officials are a terror to the evil doer.
ICE is a law enforcement agency. Their role is to enforce our country’s immigration laws. If you break our immigration laws, then a properly functioning government should be a terror to you. And that is what ICE is right now.
ICE is doing what government should be doing to people when they break our immigration laws and come here illegally. They are a terror to bad behavior and that also has curbed lawbreaking. Between the border shutdown and ICE apprehensions inland, illegal immigration is on its way to becoming an almost nonexistent problem. DHS is touting historic numbers on this front as well.
At the federal level there is a focused effort on restoring law and order. I didn’t even mention the different FBI initiatives to curb crime that the Trump administration has been touting. All of this points to a real attempt to be a terror to bring lawbreakers justice. Another way of putting it is that there is a focused effort on being a terror to the evildoer. And it’s working.
Concluding Thoughts
Things work better when we live according to the will of the One who made all things. They just do.But the educated class thinks that they can outsmart the Creator. That’s just the problem.
Here you see the glaringly obvious point. When the government is a terror to bad behavior, as Romans 13 says they are to be, less people get hurt. And we’re getting a glimpse of that today.
Less people are being robbed. Less people are being murdered. Less people are being raped. And more people are able to live in peace.
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