03 May 2011

Why a Victory Dance?

OsamaMatt 5:43 “You have heard that it was said, Love your neighbor and hate your enemy. 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven.
How do we square this verse with the victory celebration that has poured out over the news of the death of Osama bin Laden? I shed no tears for the death of this man; he sowed much evil in his life.

Should we not ask if it was right to use violence to end a person’s reign of violence? After all, if you live by the sword,  will you not die by the sword?

I do think there are times when we are to sell our cloak and buy a sword:

Luke 22 36 He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one.

It still remains that I am troubled by the hatred I’ve seen displayed at the news of his death.  People dancing and waving a flag is one thing, but to rejoice and shout “rot in hell” or something like this, I find no justification for it.

Some will say, “well, they would do the same if it had been George Bush or Barak Obama.” My response to this is, “well, we are not them.” Where is our moral high ground if we react as we say they would? And, if we purport to be a follower of Christ, how can we justify this reaction?

I suppose a little good news is welcomed when the world seems rather dark, but I still am troubled over the response I have seen. 

I would like to ask the question, Is there any time or place where when it is okay to react like? Seriously.

These are the thoughts that I am giving daylight to as I ponder this situation. It is a complicated issue, and there are no easy answers, but I think that we need to pull back from an emotional response and look seriously at the impact of this event, and consider carefully what our response should be.

Any thoughts?

25 April 2011

Jacques Ellul on Social Justice

Jacquesellul...Jesus Christ has not come to establish social justice any more than he has come to establish the power of the state or the reign of money or art. Jesus Christ has come to save men, and all that matters is that men may come to know him. We are adept at finding reasons-good theological, political, or practical reasons, for camouflaging this. But the real reason is that we let ourselves be impressed and dominated by the forces of the world, by the press, by public opinion, by the political game, by appeals to justice, liberty, peace, the poverty of the third world, and the Christian civilization of the west, all of which play on our inclinations and weaknesses. Modern protestants are in the main prepared to be all things to all men, like St. Paul, but unfortunately this is not in order that they may save some but in order that they may be like all men.  The Ethics of Freedom (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company), 254-255