We live in a material world. We use goods and services in which to maintain our physical life. This requires that we own property which we call possessions. These belong to us for enjoyment and we can dispose of them as we see fit. If lawfully obtained and used, no one has the right to tell us what we can do with them because we own them, not even the government. There is freedom in owning our own property. We do not have to be dependent upon others when we have our own assets. Theft, however, is symptom of a breakdown in the social order. We live in a day and age when we are never secure in our possessions because of rampant thievery so prevalent in our day and time.
Application
To properly understand the Bible, we need to use what is known as applied theology.
Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary renders "theft" as, "The act of stealing. In law, the private, unlawful, felonious taking of another person’s goods or movables, with an intent to steal them. To constitute theft, the taking must be in private or without the owner’s knowledge, and it must be unlawful or felonious, that is, it must be with a design to deprive the owner of his property privately and against his will." The key here is deprivation or use of. It converts property from one person to another without any form of remuneration. It is the unlawful taking of another’s goods. It is performed without the knowledge of the owner. In other words, thieves work undercover. They are sneaks and cheats.
1 Corinthians 6:10 reads, "Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God." Thieves eternal fate has already been determined by God. They will not inherit the kingdom of God. They do inherit eternal punishment. A thief is present oriented and more concerned with the material world rather than the spiritual. Revelation 9:21 says, "Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts." A thief may so be hardened in his sin that he refuses to repent of his thievery, no matter what kind of judgment the Lord may bring upon him. He does not like to work for a living. In the final analysis, thieves end up spending more energy in stealing and covering up their thefts than if they would do an honest days labor. Their intelligence is negligible.
Once a thief should come to saving knowledge, he will be convicted by the Holy Ghost to make restitution for his thefts. Webster defines "restitution" as, "1. The act of returning or restoring to a person some thing or right of which he has been unjustly deprived...2. The act of making good, or giving an equivalent for any loss, damage, or injury; indemnification. 3. The act of recovering a former state or posture." In other words, a thief will return what he has stolen and ask for forgiveness from the one that was harmed by his actions. Instead of being dishonest, he has now become honest as Ephesians 4:28 expresses, "Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth." The opposite of stealing is working. To repent is to do the opposite of what you were previously doing. Once a man begins to labor, he will have funds to provide for those who are in need. This is also a form of restitution. Sometimes a thief may have stolen from someone who is dead or cannot be located and thus by supplying the needs of others, he would essentially be making restoration in a different form.
When salvation had come to Zacchaeus’ house, he told the Lord Jesus in Luke 19:8, "And Zacchaeus stood, and said unto the Lord; Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken any thing from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold." When a man gets saved, he is willing to make whole those whom he has defrauded from their property. He is even willing to follow the law of restitution by paying the fourfold penalty. King David realized this principle when Nathan the prophet came to him regarding his sin with Bathsheba. In 2 Samuel 12:6, we read, "And he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity." This concept of fourfold repayment comes from the law of God in Exodus 22:1. If someone was caught stealing sheep, he had to repay four sheep for each he had stolen. This made getting caught for stealing an extremely expensive proposition. It had an obvious deterrent effect. The victim was to be given the restitution, not the state.
Conclusion
We live in a day and age when theft is rampant. Thieves are thrown into prison where they cannot make restitution to their victims. They continue their life of thievery by stealing from taxpayers who have to pay for them in prison. God’s law does not recognize the putting of thieves into prison. Rather, they are to labor until they have made the required reparation for their misdeeds. In the process, the thief learns to labor honestly. The victim gets repaid and the thief learns to work. God’s law is what works. Humanism’s policies are always failures. Everyone loses.
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