Hmmm. . . Seems to me that we also declare that the RIGHT of self defense is a NATURAL, even a GOD-GIVEN right, from GOD Himself, along with all our other Rights.
Barnhardt has some pertinent thoughts on loving our enemies. http://www.barnhardt.biz/2016/05/17/repost-by-request-the-one-about-capital-punishment/
There is a significance in Christ's departing words to His disciples about how they were to love, even has Christ did. Those words have to do with preaching repentance...the ultimate purpose of every Christian effort to do good. Why feed the hungry, cloth the naked, and shelter the homeless? So that they can be persuaded to listen to the Gospel.
I'll repeat that, the only reason Christ wants us to feed the hungry is so they'll listen to the Gospel, and there is a really somewhat funny part in the Gospel of John right after Christ feeds the multitude so they'll pay attention to His teachings, and some of them come to Christ the next day, He lays right into them about that. "When the people therefore saw that Jesus was not there, neither his disciples, they also took shipping, and came to Capernaum, seeking for Jesus. And when they had found him on the other side of the sea, they said unto him, Rabbi, when camest thou hither? Jesus answered them and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Ye seek me, not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled. Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you: for him hath God the Father sealed."
The discussion doesn't end (though it does involve several more insinuations that Jesus should make with the free bread again) until Jesus has managed to offend them so badly with all the talk of spiritual nourishment that, "From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him."
"Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life."
I am frankly unimpressed with the sort of "Christians" who forget that preaching repentance to the world is their main Christian duty, the duty from which all others flow and which therefore no other duty can supersede.
There is a reason Christ doesn't say much about civil government other than that it provides an important function in preserving peace and order...Christ knew perfectly well that having the main civil government run by actual Christians (or even nominal ones, though that matters not at all in Christ's view) would be such a rarity that there was no real need to speak to the subject. But Christ did charge His disciples outside of the government to take responsibility for providing the goods of defending innocent lives, whether by supplying bread or defensive force.
For the purpose of getting opportunities to preach repentance. If you've got two persons with competing survival needs and you can only save one of them, you save the one that's more likely to listen to a call to repentance (not more likely to need a call to repentance, everyone needs to be called to repentance, the difference is who seems more disposed to heed a call, that's really all we mean by 'innocent' when everyone's a sinner anyway). If that means giving bread to one and not the other, so be it. If it means interrupting a fight to the death by killing one of them...there's really not that big a difference. You save the life of the one that is more likely to respond by heeding a call to repentance.
Yes, based on your judgment. And you have a responsibility to judge wisely. But you can't evade that responsibility by delegating it to someone else...it's still your judgment. That's great if you delegate it to someone who really is wiser than you, it's not so great if you delegated it to psychopathic murderers because you wanted to "avoid judging". Guess what? Delegating your responsibility to make a judgment to a psychopathic murderer is a judgment, and you're still accountable for it in the end.
Not only what is said in the Bible can give you clues as to how Christ felt about weapons, but sometimes what is NOT said is equally important.
The moment of his arrest, he told his Apostles to put their swords away. He did not ask why they had them on their persons, nor did he ask them to surrender their weapons either.
The inescapable conclusion is, Jesus was quite comfortable walking with armed men who were prepared to do defend Him as well as themselves.
5 comments:
I seem to remember Jesus saying something OTHER than "you don't need a sword, only centurions should have swords".
Moses killed the Egyptian, not God.
-Bibleater
Hmmm. . . Seems to me that we also declare that the RIGHT of self defense is a NATURAL, even a GOD-GIVEN right, from GOD Himself, along with all our other Rights.
B Woodman
III-per
Barnhardt has some pertinent thoughts on loving our enemies.
http://www.barnhardt.biz/2016/05/17/repost-by-request-the-one-about-capital-punishment/
There is a significance in Christ's departing words to His disciples about how they were to love, even has Christ did. Those words have to do with preaching repentance...the ultimate purpose of every Christian effort to do good. Why feed the hungry, cloth the naked, and shelter the homeless? So that they can be persuaded to listen to the Gospel.
I'll repeat that, the only reason Christ wants us to feed the hungry is so they'll listen to the Gospel, and there is a really somewhat funny part in the Gospel of John right after Christ feeds the multitude so they'll pay attention to His teachings, and some of them come to Christ the next day, He lays right into them about that. "When the people therefore saw that Jesus was not there, neither his disciples, they also took shipping, and came to Capernaum, seeking for Jesus. And when they had found him on the other side of the sea, they said unto him, Rabbi, when camest thou hither? Jesus answered them and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Ye seek me, not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled. Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you: for him hath God the Father sealed."
The discussion doesn't end (though it does involve several more insinuations that Jesus should make with the free bread again) until Jesus has managed to offend them so badly with all the talk of spiritual nourishment that, "From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him."
"Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life."
I am frankly unimpressed with the sort of "Christians" who forget that preaching repentance to the world is their main Christian duty, the duty from which all others flow and which therefore no other duty can supersede.
There is a reason Christ doesn't say much about civil government other than that it provides an important function in preserving peace and order...Christ knew perfectly well that having the main civil government run by actual Christians (or even nominal ones, though that matters not at all in Christ's view) would be such a rarity that there was no real need to speak to the subject. But Christ did charge His disciples outside of the government to take responsibility for providing the goods of defending innocent lives, whether by supplying bread or defensive force.
For the purpose of getting opportunities to preach repentance. If you've got two persons with competing survival needs and you can only save one of them, you save the one that's more likely to listen to a call to repentance (not more likely to need a call to repentance, everyone needs to be called to repentance, the difference is who seems more disposed to heed a call, that's really all we mean by 'innocent' when everyone's a sinner anyway). If that means giving bread to one and not the other, so be it. If it means interrupting a fight to the death by killing one of them...there's really not that big a difference. You save the life of the one that is more likely to respond by heeding a call to repentance.
Yes, based on your judgment. And you have a responsibility to judge wisely. But you can't evade that responsibility by delegating it to someone else...it's still your judgment. That's great if you delegate it to someone who really is wiser than you, it's not so great if you delegated it to psychopathic murderers because you wanted to "avoid judging". Guess what? Delegating your responsibility to make a judgment to a psychopathic murderer is a judgment, and you're still accountable for it in the end.
Not only what is said in the Bible can give you clues as to how Christ felt about weapons, but sometimes what is NOT said is equally important.
The moment of his arrest, he told his Apostles to put their swords away. He did not ask why they had them on their persons, nor did he ask them to surrender their weapons either.
The inescapable conclusion is, Jesus was quite comfortable walking with armed men who were prepared to do defend Him as well as themselves.
Post a Comment