The past week has brought a surprising increase in security incidents. On Sunday, British police foiled what appears to be an Iran-backed plot against an airbase housing American bombers. On Wednesday, a radicalized copilot nearly flew an Israel-bound flight into the ground. On Thursday, the Texas Department of Public Safety arrested a man planning to attack the Texas state capitol for anti-Semitic reasons, and an employee of the U.S. Department of Energy was arrested for allegedly providing material support to the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen.

Fortunately, all these plots were stopped before the perpetrators could inflict their intended harm. But they serve to illustrate the ongoing relevance of vigilant security. Even at a time when voters are most concerned about their economic affairs — the cost of living, rising prices and interest rates, job prospects — security remains a relevant and primary concern of government.

Security even supplies a presupposition for economic debates. Until people lead safe and stable lives, their aspirations for prosperity take a backseat. The principle applies whether the danger is internal to a nation (from criminals) or external (from foreign actors).

This is such an obvious connection that the Bible devotes little attention to spelling it out. It does, however, provide some snapshots in passing. When Midianite raiders oppressed Israel, “the people of Israel made for themselves the dens that are in the mountains and the caves and the strongholds. For whenever the Israelites planted crops, the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the East would come up against them” (Judges 6:2-3).

Who cares about a fancy house that will only become a target? The Israelites lived in caves simply to hide. And who cares about increasing the productivity of a field if foreign raiders are just going to carry away the fruit?

The inspired writer continues to give an example of the non-optimal economic practices this military insecurity produced. When the angel first appeared to Gideon, “Gideon was beating out wheat in the winepress to hide it from the Midianites” (Judges 6:11).

Ideally, farmers would thresh their wheat on threshing floors at the top of hills, where passing breezes would more easily carry away the chaff. But Gideon threshed his wheat in a winepress, further down in the valley, where Midianite scouts would be less likely to spot him. The same amount of work might take more effort, but security is more important than efficiency.

Israel’s vulnerability to raids illustrated the central point of Judges, which was that it had no king. (God was its king, but they repeatedly rejected him.) This point came to a crisis at the end of Samuel’s career, when the people demanded, “there shall be a king over us, that we also may be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles” (1 Samuel 8:19-20). Central to their understanding of the job description of a king is one who would fight their battles.

God interpreted their demand to Samuel, “They have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them” (1 Samuel 8:7). And, as a matter of fact, God had been the ruler who most recently fought and won their battles (1 Samuel 7:10).

Another way to describe a government’s role is to say that the ruler “bears the sword,” as Paul says in Romans 13:4. Temporal governments are invested with the authority to use force, both against criminals and foreign powers. This is the role they fill as “God’s servant” (Romans 13:4) to preserve life, maintain justice, correct oppression, and establish order in this fallen world.

On this point, a biblical worldview contradicts the contemporary leftists who condemn the government’s use of force (not just excessive force, but any force) and seek to replace police activities with social work.

Secular philosophies accord with and borrow from the biblical view. For instance, in Federalist Paper No. 3, Publius (John Jay) wrote that, “Among the many objects to which a wise and free people find it necessary to direct their attention, that of providing for their SAFETY seems to be the first.” He gave this as a justification for addressing the topic so early in the series of letters, indicating an expectation that most readers would agree with the statement.

The founders derived such ideas from numerous sources, including the famous Second Treatise on Government by classical liberal philosopher John Locke. Locke wrote that “the reason why men enter into society, is the preservation of their property.”

For his over-idealized “state of nature,” Locke conceived “a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one” that “no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions.” The reason for this law, according to Locke, is, “men being all the workmanship of one omnipotent, and infinitely wise maker … they are his property, whose workmanship they are, made to last during his, not one another’s pleasure.” In other words, Locke grounded his prohibitions on theft and murder in the fact that every person is created by God.

Locke argued further that such a law of nature implied a natural right to self-defense. “That all men may be restrained … from doing hurt to one another … the execution of the law of nature is” that “every one has a right to punish the transgressors of that law to such a degree, as may hinder its violation,” he said. But circumstances make it more convenient for individuals to combine into civil societies, and to delegate their right of self-defense to a government charged with protecting life and property, he concludes.

Readers need not agree with Locke’s conception of a “state of nature” to catch the significance of his point. There are certainly biblical issues with Locke’s thought, such as his too-positive view of human nature and contradictions between Locke’s imaginary state of nature and the history recorded in Genesis 1-3. Even so, Locke uses Scripture, and specifically God’s creation of man, as a reason for protecting human life and property.

Indeed, Locke specifically quotes from Genesis 9:6, “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.”

Here God establishes a principle for using force as a deterrent to defend human life. As part of the Noahic covenant, this principle was not exclusively for the people of Israel, but for all the descendants of Noah, which includes everyone alive on earth after the Flood.

The means by which humanity carries out this Noahic principle is through the government role as protector, “wielding the sword” against those who would do evil. God’s ways are wisest, and the methods he ordains yield the most prosperous human societies. This is why the government’s responsibility to provide security, against violence both internal and external, matters not only to the preservation of life but as a precondition for every other policy discussion.