THERE IS A SNAKE IN MY BOOT - Woody from TOY STORY
My Dad is a WW 2 vet and I come from a long line of veterans and warriors. I disliked fighting so much as a kid, that when someone wanted to fight me, I told them to fight my twin brother. He looked just like me so what difference did it make? They always took me up on my offer and I avoided a lot of fights in my younger years.
As a young man, I supported every war and thought every Christian should fight in them. I was too young to fight in Vietnam and after that war, I questioned all wars. Why should Christians fight and kill? Why was our country acting like a theocracy since it fought it wars for its own national interests rather than the interests of God? As a Christian pacifist, I could kill people with my tongue who supported or fought in wars even when I promoted an ethic of love and non-violence. I did not see my own hyprocrisy of the violence in my words and deeds towards others I differed with.
Even though I believed Christians should fight evil, I struggled with surpressing the warrior spirit within me. Somewhere stuck between the bully soldier and the doormat pacifist, I knew there was still something missing deep within my soul of being on the front lines for God.
Somewhere in the debate and outright assaults between hawks who support war and doves who don't, the snake of Satan has cunningly won more of these battles in the end and mocks us in the process. God who is our divine warrior assaults all of our self-prescribed idealogies and pretensions and unmasks them for the idols they are!
Firepower and disarmanent are both idols when we trust more in them than we do God. God does not care about our human fabrications whether they are political or religious. What God wants is faithfulness to Him and Him alone!
Is it possible that God is calling us to a spiritual battle and to be on His frontlines rather than armed milatary conflict or passive do-nothingism? Is it not more accurate biblically to talk about Jesus bringing heaven to us rather than us going to heaven? Is it possisble that all the talks and endless chatter of the problems of this world and Hawks and Doves is another sly maneuver of the enemy to slither past us and into God's camp? To truly be God's peacemaker, then we must have the courage and boldness to be warriors for the kingdom of God.
My Dad is a WW 2 vet and I come from a long line of veterans and warriors. I disliked fighting so much as a kid, that when someone wanted to fight me, I told them to fight my twin brother. He looked just like me so what difference did it make? They always took me up on my offer and I avoided a lot of fights in my younger years.
As a young man, I supported every war and thought every Christian should fight in them. I was too young to fight in Vietnam and after that war, I questioned all wars. Why should Christians fight and kill? Why was our country acting like a theocracy since it fought it wars for its own national interests rather than the interests of God? As a Christian pacifist, I could kill people with my tongue who supported or fought in wars even when I promoted an ethic of love and non-violence. I did not see my own hyprocrisy of the violence in my words and deeds towards others I differed with.
Even though I believed Christians should fight evil, I struggled with surpressing the warrior spirit within me. Somewhere stuck between the bully soldier and the doormat pacifist, I knew there was still something missing deep within my soul of being on the front lines for God.
Somewhere in the debate and outright assaults between hawks who support war and doves who don't, the snake of Satan has cunningly won more of these battles in the end and mocks us in the process. God who is our divine warrior assaults all of our self-prescribed idealogies and pretensions and unmasks them for the idols they are!
Firepower and disarmanent are both idols when we trust more in them than we do God. God does not care about our human fabrications whether they are political or religious. What God wants is faithfulness to Him and Him alone!
Is it possible that God is calling us to a spiritual battle and to be on His frontlines rather than armed milatary conflict or passive do-nothingism? Is it not more accurate biblically to talk about Jesus bringing heaven to us rather than us going to heaven? Is it possisble that all the talks and endless chatter of the problems of this world and Hawks and Doves is another sly maneuver of the enemy to slither past us and into God's camp? To truly be God's peacemaker, then we must have the courage and boldness to be warriors for the kingdom of God.
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