“A Christian Response To War”
Matthew 5:9
March 23, 2003
I’ve heard it said that one of the best ways to make God laugh is for us to make plans. I typically have my sermons planned in advance, which allows me to better focus my thoughts and coordinate worship, which probably made God chuckle this past week; for as I began preparing for worship, I could not focus my thoughts on the sermon I had planned. The words of our President on Monday night and the images of military attacks on Wednesday night kept running through my mind. We go to bed at night wandering what will happen while we’re asleep, and we wake up in the morning anxious to hear what’s happened. TV’s and radios are tuned to the war in Iraq.
As Christians, how should we to respond to war? Should we oppose it or support it? Would Christ oppose it or support it? What does scripture say? The third chapter of Ecclesiastes says, “For everything there is a season…a time for war and a time for peace.” Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”
I dare say that all of us have been thinking about this war, and some of us may have arrived at an opinion on how we should be handling the situation. I don’t come before you today to tell you what opinion to hold; rather I come before you today to encourage us to consider the Christian beliefs that should shape our opinions.
Robert Parham is the executive director of the Baptist Center for Ethics, and this past week, he wrote a brilliant article about Christian citizenship in wartime. He said that we must preserve a high wall between Christ and culture. Matthew gives us an account in the 22nd chapter of Jesus being questioned by a Pharisee. The Pharisee approaches Jesus and attempts to butter him up. He tells Jesus that he knows that Jesus is a sincere man, who teaches the way of God in accordance with the truth, showing partiality to no one. He then asks him, “Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?”
Jesus holds up a coin and asks him, “Whose head is this?” “The emperor’s.” “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” Jesus acknowledged that leaders are supposed to lead their respective states and countries, but Jesus refused to worship the political structure of the state. He worshipped only God, and he wanted to make it clear that God and God only is worthy of our worship.
Elected leaders of our states and countries will lead and make decisions, and Jesus is saying, “Respect them. Give them their due,” but politics, and the power that comes with it, can become seductive. War and the power that comes with war can become so seductive that it becomes idolatrous. War evokes many emotions, and our charge is to maintain a Christ-centered perspective so that our emotions, egos, and adrenalin don’t draw us toward idolatry. It’s easy to become wrapped up in what the state is doing to the point that we ignore what God would have us do.
We must also practice discernment. When Jesus commissioned the twelve disciples for their mission in Matthew’s twelfth chapter, he told them that he was sending them out like sheep in the midst of wolves, and they needed to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. Wisdom means prudent thinking, and careful consideration of all facts and details.
I can’t even begin to appreciate the weight that our President must have felt and is feeling in making the decision to go to war. I will not pass judgment on that decision, and I think we would all be wise to not do the same, because we don’t have all the facts and know all the details. My hope is that our President, as a self-proclaimed, born-again Christian, is being as wise as a serpent and as innocent as a dove.
And we must do the same. As I have listened in on conversations about the war, there are far too many people holding the opinion, “Let’s go over there and turn Iraq into a parking lot.” Would that be an exercise in wisdom and innocence? There are just as many people proclaiming that we should sit on our hands and do nothing. Would that be an exercise in wisdom and innocence?
Discernment in Scripture is the skill that enables us to differentiate. Discernment is the ability to see issues clearly. We desperately need to cultivate this spiritual skill that will enable us to know right from wrong. We must be prepared to distinguish light from darkness, truth from error, best from better, righteousness from unrighteousness, and purity from defilement. A Christian’s response to war must include discernment, that we might be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves.
Jesus also told us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. This is difficult, because contrary to what many think, Jesus never told us to pray only for our troops and ask for a shield of protection only around America. One of the greatest dangers of this hour is spiritual nationalism, in which we merge our nation and patriotism with the will of God. Patriotism and the will of God cannot be merged. Favoring war does not make one un-Christian, just as opposing war does not make one unpatriotic and un-American. The two can coexist.
Yes, we must pray for our President, for our military leaders, for the men and women, some of whom are related to you and are our friends and neighbors; but our Christian faith demands that we pray for the welfare of all. Some of you may have been taken aback that my morning prayer included Saddam Hussein, his family, and his country, but Christ makes it very clear that we are to pray for them as well.
It’s not easy to lift up a terrorist dictator in prayer. It’s not natural, but he and his fellow countrymen are children of God. There are many innocent men, women, and children, who will suffer because of this war, and suffering is an affront to God, whether that suffering comes as a result of poverty, disease, draught, or war. It is our responsibility to pray for all.
And finally, we must pursue peacemaking. In our scripture passage this morning, Jesus said, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”
General Omar Bradley, who fought in WWII said, “We have too many men of science and too few men of God. We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace and more about killing than we know about living.” Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.
How do we become peacemakers? The word for peace in its original Hebrew is shalom. Translating shalom as peace never means merely the absence of trouble; rather it means everything that benefits one’s highest good. When you say shalom to someone, you are not saying that you wish them the absence of evil; you are wishing for them the presence of all good things. In the Bible peace means not only freedom from trouble, it means enjoyment of all that is good.
If we are to be peacemakers, we are not only to remove the presence of evil, but we are to remove injustice, racism, exploitation, bigotry, and oppression. We’re not only to eradicate those situations and circumstances, but we’re to create an environment where people can thrive, realize their potential, and enjoy the goodness that we so richly desire for ourselves. We are to be peacemakers, not simply by removing problems, but by offering solutions of goodness and fulfillment.
Abraham Lincoln once said: “Die when I may, I would like it to be said of me, that I always pulled up a weed and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow.” This beatitude is saying that blessed are those who not only remove evil, but blessed are those who also make this world a better place.
This beatitude clearly tells us that the blessing is upon those who make peace, and not merely upon those who love peace. It very often happens that if someone loves peace in the wrong way, he succeeds in making trouble instead of peace. Peace-lovers may allow a threatening and dangerous situation to develop, because they did not want to take any action in the name of peace. There is many a person who thinks he is loving peace, when in fact he is piling up trouble for the future, because he refuses to face the situation and to take the action that the situation demands. It is one thing to not create conflict, but it’s another thing to run away and hide from it. Peace-lovers will often take this approach and allow trouble to gather at their door.
The peace, which the Bible calls blessed, does not come from the evasion of issues; it comes from facing them, dealing with them, and overcoming them. What this beatitude demands is not the passive acceptance of things because we’re afraid of doing anything about, but the active facing of issues and the making of peace, even when the way to peace is through struggle.
Many folk, including out President, would say that this war is a necessary struggle for peace. I will neither agree nor disagree, because I don’t have all the information, and he may be right; but a few weeks ago, former President Jimmy Carter, himself a Southern Baptist, wrote an article, “Just War- or a Just War?”
He says that a war is just when war is being waged as a last resort. As a Christian, I would agree with him.
Is this just war or a just war? I don’t know, but as Christians our response is clear: our worship must be of God and not of the seductive idolatry of power and war; we must practice discernment and be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves in deciding to wage war; we must be in prayer for our President, our military, and our allies, but also for those who we oppose; and we must be peacemakers. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God. Amen.
