Lies We Are Told About God — Pt 10

Many years ago in Marine Basic Trai­ning I recall lear­ning about “The Law of War.”  To most of us the phrase itself sounds pecu­liar. “Law of War?” isn’t that an oxy­mo­ron?  Doesn’t the word “war” desc­ribe con­duct that is usually outside the boun­da­ries of law? Most peo­ple would think so, but there is indeed a body of law that governs the con­duct of war.

The sub­ject is actually very com­plex but is com­po­sed of two main ethi­cal ques­tions : First, when is war jus­ti­fia­ble? Second, what con­duct is allo­wa­ble in war?

The first ques­tion was not one we spent much time on. Eigh­teen year-old Mari­nes are told when to go to war and assume that their lea­ders have made the correct deci­sion on whether or not the war is jus­ti­fia­ble. A figh­ting force that did not have con­fi­dence in their lea­dership to make these impor­tant deci­sions would not be very effec­tive. Ima­gine the sce­na­rio, “alright Mari­nes” the ser­geant growls, “we’re going to take that beach from the enemy – any ques­tions?” One of the pri­va­tes replies “one quick ques­tion sarge — just so I can feel good about this mis­sion — what did they do to deserve us taking the beach from them?” Doesn’t sound like a good recipe for unity.

The second ques­tion (con­duct that is allo­wa­ble in war) we spent an exhaus­tive amount of time on. We cove­red which peo­ple we were allo­wed to fight, where we could fight them, what wea­pons we could use, how we had to treat them if cap­tu­red, and what would hap­pen to us if we broke these rules. Many of us thought – “wow, they can do anything to us, but we can’t reta­liate in kind.”

It’s easy on the sur­face to see these rules as unjust. The enemy will bomb and threa­ten non-combatants, but we won’t.  The enemy will tor­ture and starve us without mercy, but we won’t. The enemy will dis­re­gard the safety of their own citi­zens to get to us, but we won’t. To an eigh­teen year-old, these rules soun­ded ridi­cu­lous. Isn’t the old saying “all’s fair in love and war?”

The truth is no. All is not fair in love and war. In war — when you prac­tice bar­ba­ric acts you become a bar­ba­rian. The just cause that you fight for beco­mes tar­nished by your willing­ness to dis­re­gard your own values. Civi­li­za­tion fades from view and all that you are left with are two ani­mal packs figh­ting for sur­vi­val. It is hard to return from this pre­ci­pice. Once you have aban­do­ned huma­nity, it is hard to rejoin. The num­ber of trau­ma­ti­zed sol­diers who return from war tes­tify to this fact. Many strug­gle to cope with what they have seen, and perhaps what they them­sel­ves have done. Human beings are simply not made to be at peace with the suf­fe­ring of others. Cons­tant expo­sure to such suf­fe­ring warps us and chan­ges our pers­pec­tive. Some even begin to deve­lop a taste for it, a han­ke­ring for vengeance.

How many of us can recall watching an action film where the hero has finally cor­ne­red the villain and has him com­ple­tely at his mercy? How many of us at that point are men­tally chee­ring the hero to “finish him!” I have felt that vica­rious lust for ven­geance at such times. I have been stun­ned by my own thoughts. I believe that our cul­ture is satu­ra­ted with this blood lust and it has so tho­roughly satu­ra­ted us we may have dif­fi­culty sen­sing it.

During the recent Hai­tian tra­gedy, a pro­mi­nent Chris­tian made a widely repor­ted com­ment offe­ring an expla­na­tion for why the earth­quake hap­pe­ned. While his spe­ci­fic com­ments were mis­re­pre­sen­ted, the subs­tance of his expla­na­tion was that God had allo­wed the earth­quake to occur because of the past sins of the Hai­tian peo­ple (in this case voo­doo). When I heard this repor­ted in the media – my imme­diate thought was “why don’t some Chris­tians know when to shut-up?” But I think these kinds of com­ments raise a dee­per ques­tion about God him­self. Spe­ci­fi­cally, does God delight in the suf­fe­ring of others? Is he thri­lled to see the villains get their punishment?

I believe this is one of the grea­test lies about God being spread today. That God rejoi­ces when peo­ple suf­fer. That if we don’t do things his way he can’t wait to dole out punish­ment.  We even quote scrip­ture to rein­force this image of God. “Ven­geance is mine, says the Lord.” We pic­ture an angry gray-bearded guy in a stone chair hol­ding a light­ning bolt in his hand with an angry expres­sion on his face. First, we tell peo­ple that God is really holy. Then we tell them that because of that he can’t stand to be in the pre­sence of their sin, and that they deserve to be in hell because of it. We explain that he is angry with them, and unless they repent he will toss them into hell. Lucky for them there is a way out of this mess. If they say the pra­yer just right and accept Jesus, then this really angry God will forgo his wrath and for­give them.

The plan of course is to scare them so bad that they want to turn from sin to God. But what is mis­sing from this mis­re­pre­sen­ta­tion of the truth – is the Father’s heart. Unlike the sol­dier who for­gets him­self in his quest for revenge on the enemy, God does not want revenge on us. Ven­geance is his by right, but not by desire. He is the mer­ci­ful father who would give anything to keep one of his kids from being sepa­ra­ted from him. He is the one who waits at the end of the road scan­ning the hori­zon — hoping that this is the day that his lost son or daugh­ter choo­ses to come home. God is not a tyrant. He does not rejoice in evil or suf­fe­ring – even suf­fe­ring we have brought upon our­sel­ves. He is filled with kind­ness and com­pas­sion. He desi­res that mercy would triumph over jus­tice. He gra­ciously covers our naked­ness and ban­da­ges our wounds. He is grie­ved by our wrong choi­ces and our rejec­tion of him. And yes – he will allow us to choose hell over him. But it breaks a father’s heart when that happens.

~Truly Free