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BBBCanada
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/13/2010 9:54 AM (GMT -6) |   | Loving our Enemies to Death?
When I hear Greg say, like he said in a sermon that I recently listened to at the WH's site, that killing our enemies is un-Christ like while at the same time, on the other hand, hearing that in some cases, Christian love will require there to be a "stop action" it is with the reasoning in this article that I understand that a stop action will require the use of death in particular situations.
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
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Similitude
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| Posted 8/14/2010 12:23 PM (GMT -6) | | If God dwelt in Annanias and Sapphiras, how does that have implications about whether killing is intrinsically unloving? It can't as far as I can tell. IOW, if killing is a means to God's own ends, we can't know a priori that God can't use a human's volitional obedience as the means to such a killing. That would have to be argued in terms of an a posteriori argument. This is why Zach contends that God had nothing to do with the killing of Annanias. The minute you condede otherwise, you have to make an argument over and beyond the mere presence of God in humans.
Post Edited (Similitude) : 8/14/2010 12:28:16 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 8/14/2010 12:38 PM (GMT -6) | | Good point, Jeff. Killing people can't be intrinsically unloving if God can do it. Got that. At the same time, show me a human being who kills another human being while perfectly adhering to the Great Commandments of Jesus. More particularly, show me an American soldier to actively thinks about the Great Commandments and Jesus' commandment about "loving your enemy" while they are shooting or bombing the enemy. I don't think you'll find many, if any.
In other words, if you want to do some of the things God does, you'd better well have the CHARACTER of God when you do it. Else it's sin. Agreed?
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Post Edited (One Love) : 8/14/2010 12:58:40 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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BBBCanada
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Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/14/2010 4:44 PM (GMT -6) | | See...I'm thinking of this in terms of the already not yet. It's a lesser of two evils sort of thing. Hitler. Hussein. Osama bin Laden. There's something morally eskew if you completely answer this as D has done. That one should NEVER use force of this nature. Just doesn't sit with me D. Doesn't. This is not about "Doing some things God does so you better have the character first." C'mon. In that case we might as well sit on our derrieres. Maybe I'm mis-understanding you? But I understand you to say in that case, that police should never use force of that nature as, well, they ain't up-right citizen's either (morally speaking).
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
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BBBCanada
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| Posted 8/14/2010 4:53 PM (GMT -6) | | One more thing. This is one of the reasons why some Christians (and scholars) make a distinction between personal revenge and something on a larger societal level. Sure. You and I should not kill our enemies, we should not resist evil with evil. But could you imagine if the state did not carry out it responsibility of not restraining evil?
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
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One Love
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| Posted 8/14/2010 4:57 PM (GMT -6) | | | I will cite 1 Corinthians 13...and the Great Commandments. I don't care WHAT kind of utilitarian activity is going on or WHAT kind of lives are being saved. If it's not grounded in LOVE...then...fill in the rest.
"If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing."
If anyone here can show me how Christians are allowed by God to put aside the Great Commandments AND 1 Corinthians 13 in order to promote some attempt at peace or justice...I'll give them 20 bucks!
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One Love
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| Posted 8/14/2010 5:00 PM (GMT -6) | | | I am not saying that at all. What I'm saying is very simple: For Christians, WHATEVER is not done out of love is NOTHING...no matter how outwardly helpful or beneficent. Period.
Christianly speaking, what good does it do ANYONE to save hundreds of people by consistently sanctioning and justifying the effective annulment of the Great Commandments and 1 Corinthians 13??
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. | | Back to Top | | |
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BBBCanada
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Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/14/2010 5:08 PM (GMT -6) | | I think we're operating with different understandings and levels of justice. In this case, should a cop, who is NOT a believer, NEVER kill someone because:
A. That can't be done out of love?
B. Because the criminal has God in them?
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
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One Love
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| Posted 8/14/2010 5:09 PM (GMT -6) | | I want to say this to CHRISTIANS about using force, including deadly force:
"In searching your conscience, if you can't genuinely do it according to the standards of the Great Commandments of Jesus and 1 Corinthians 13, then don't do it at all. You are not glorifying Christ by it."
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One Love
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| Posted 8/14/2010 5:14 PM (GMT -6) | | Hey, Brandon. I would like to know though. Do you disagree with my statment?
"In searching your conscience, if you can't genuinely do it according to the standards of the Great Commandments of Jesus and 1 Corinthians 13, then don't do it at all. You are not glorifying Christ by it."
First of all, is this a TRUE statement for any member of Christ's Body, Scripturally speaking?
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BBBCanada
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| Posted 8/14/2010 5:20 PM (GMT -6) | | Hmmm...the question still stands. Christian or not. You have someone who is going to push a little red button and in about a half hour all of New York is obliterated. People are vapourized. On the edges of the blast zone millions of others will die a horrible, horrible death within weeks. Further than that, millions more are going to be burned and mutated. Because the person has God in them are you saying that deadly force should NEVER be used? Or can you do that in love? I'll give you the love thing (for now though). Sure. There can be so many variables as Tom pointed out. But I'm asking the NEVER question. Even in "clear cases." Never. Never can do it because the person has God in them. Personally, I do see love operating for one's fellow man in such instances.
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
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BBBCanada
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| Posted 8/14/2010 8:06 PM (GMT -6) | | |
See, here's my thing D. This guy is writing about politics. His view is what he thinks the U.S. as a nation should do. Not the U.S. as a Christian nation. Not you or I personally as Christians. He's saying that a nation, such as the U.S. can use deadly force against it's enemies. Love for someone else or love for God seems to play a major factor which is the whole point of his article. Love in some instances uses just retribution.
As far as whether non-Christians are bound to Christ's commands, seems to me problematic for two reasons.
1. I have never really bought into the idea wholesale that non-Christians are not in ANY WAY bound to imperatives in scripture (funny, now you seem to see that there ARE commands in scripture). Certainly, non-Christians should not be told by government to love their neighbour. Here they are not bound. However, if someone doesn't pay their employee for the work that he/she has done? If someone wants to own slaves again? If someone wants to force little children to have sex with them? You're damn right they're bound.
2. My idea here is A LOT more wholistic than you think D. It's WAY more encompassing than something being helpful or beneficent. God puts us on this planet and expects us to cultivate it. I happen to believe that government (I don't care about particular ideologies at this point) is a part of the cultural mandate. The whole idea of governing, for me, did not take place as a result of the fall. This is a whole area of life wherein God gives us say so. As you know (and I'm pretty sure Greg, yourself, Tommy and a host of other folk on this board would agree) there is an infinite amount variables and idiosyncrasies of human life (I'm not so much worried about whether one will make the "proper" decision at this point--some things are a leap of faith). But these variables and idiosyncrasies don't rule out our ability and responsiblity to make accurate judgments about a particular person, city office or offense. That's the whole beauty of it. God allows for us to make judgments and decisions about the world with all these things in play. Though the scriptures are not some divinely inspired encyclopedia wherein all human knowledge is found in godly form? They don't tell us everything? They do show us a foundation of everything. Not only who God is, who we are, how we came into being, what we live for, how and why we do evil and know suffering but even (most importantly?) how we might be redeem. And that redemption plays out both individually and sociologically/politically in justice.
From what I gather, fundamentally, you and I disagree on this. I find that what you are saying undermines justice. One could possibly on your view not bother with working out the economics of some third world country in order to bring redemption and wholeness from the brokenness because its not done in love. How about justice?
Lastly, I don't know if I totally buy into the idea that if I don't do something out of love then it is nothing. This is why I was looking at the blog by Stackhouse on the Win-Win-Win Scenario of Christianity. We care for others because it ultimately benefits us--"The lover's well-being is dependent on the well-being of the loved."
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
Post Edited (BBBCanada) : 8/14/2010 8:10:28 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 8/14/2010 8:29 PM (GMT -6) | | Brandon:
See, here's my thing D. This guy is writing about politics. His view is what he thinks the U.S. as a nation should do. Not the U.S. as a Christian nation. Not you or I personally as Christians. He's saying that a nation, such as the U.S. can use deadly force against it's enemies. Love for someone else or love for God seems to play a major factor which is the whole point of his article. Love in some instances uses just retribution.
As I look at the "about Us" section of the CPJ webite, I saw this...part of their threefold purpose:
1. Serve God. We aspire to a United States and a world in which citizens, particularly Christians, take their civic responsibilities seriously as a service to God, until the kingdom of God comes in its fullness.
From the beginning, God has called men and women to serve him with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength. Yet we live in a broken, unjust world in which citizens, political leaders, governments, and nongovernmental institutions are marred by sin. In reconciling the world to God, Jesus Christ frees us from sin's bondage. Through faith in Christ, we are restored to God's service in all areas of life in families, churches, schools, the workplace, charitable organizations, and politics. Citizenship and government are not evils to be avoided but gifts of God for our good. The Center's foremost purpose is to serve God by obeying his call to do justice.
Now, it's my understand that, as a member of the CPJ, the author would be a Christian and speaking from a Christian perspective here. Am I wrong about that? I don't see how. He specifically mentions being a Christian and Christianity multiple times in the article. He's not just talking about America...he's talking about American CHRISTIANS. See here..
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There is a steadily declining certainty in America—even (or especially) within Christian communities—that the taking of a human life is compatible with love. Increasingly love seems characterized by a maudlin benignity that sanitizes it of anything we find uncomfortable; including the necessity of love to stand in judgment. But Paul, in his letter to the Roman church, reminds us that true love carries a double-mandate: a profound abhorrence of evil and an unfathomable devotion to goodness. This will require that we jettison the notion that love is merely benevolence—the advancing of another’s well-being through kindness and a desire to see them happy. Instead, love wills the good of the other and is willing to cause suffering and unhappiness if these are the only means to achieve this good.
Considered through this lens, enemy-love requires our interest in seeing our enemy restrained from the performance of evil, not only for the sake of defending the victim, but because we know that the doing of evil is not good for the enemy. Truly, authentically, not good for him. And clear-sighted love hates evil’s assault on goodness. Augustine reminds us that, “Just as it is not an act of kindness to help a man, when the effect is to make him lose a greater good, so it is not a blameless act to spare a man, when by doing so you let him fall into greater sin.”
That this seems outrageous to many suggests that American Christians are forgetting that one of the primary functions of politics is to serve as a postlapsarian remedy for sin. A principle motivation for Christian involvement in political life is to restrain evil, prevent the worst, do no harm, and to help where we can. Said in another way: too many no longer genuinely believe evil is something to be resisted and overcome within history. Granted, evil will not be overcome until the end of time—but we must eliminate particular evils and diminish others, even now.
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If the author IS Christian...and CPJ is essentially a group of Christians, then my point definitely stands. Again...for CHRISTIAN PEOPLE who are thinking about using lethal force for promoting justice:
"In searching your conscience, if you can't genuinely do it according to the standards of the Great Commandments of Jesus and 1 Corinthians 13, then don't do it at all. You are not glorifying Christ by it."
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One Love
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| Posted 8/14/2010 8:36 PM (GMT -6) | | Brandon:
I find that what you are saying undermines justice. One could possibly on your view not bother with working out the economics of some third world country in order to bring redemption and wholeness from the brokenness because its not done in love. How about justice?
Dude...it's right there in the text. 1 Corinthians 13. Whatever's not done in love is nothing. And that makes sense because GOD IS LOVE.
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Brandon:
Lastly, I don't know if I totally buy into the idea that if I don't do something out of love then it is nothing.
Unbelievable. Let me just quote it then...
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
...or maybe this...1 Cor 16
Let all that you do be done in love.
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Post Edited (One Love) : 8/14/2010 8:45:31 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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BBBCanada
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Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/14/2010 9:48 PM (GMT -6) | | | Dude. He is not referring to just Christians here. He says:
"How, then, does love act in the international arena? Responding to injustice between nations through restraint and punishment may demand the killing of our adversary in war."
He is not addressing the question of whether Christians personally may kill their adversary PER SE. He is saying that a Christian can hold to the understanding (and base a policy on that) that responding to injustice between nations may require deadly force in **WAR** (between nations not you and I as individuals).
D: Brandon:
I find that what you are saying undermines justice. One could possibly on your view not bother with working out the economics of some third world country in order to bring redemption and wholeness from the brokenness because its not done in love. How about justice?
Dude...it's right there in the text. 1 Corinthians 13. Whatever's not done in love is nothing. And that makes sense because GOD IS LOVE.
and
D: One more thing, Brandon. You said: One could possibly on your view not bother with working out the economics of some third world country in order to bring redemption and wholeness from the brokenness because its not done in love.For a Christian, that doesn't make any sense whatsoever. That's basically resigning oneself NOT to be loving...instead of asking the Spirit to CULTIVATE love in oneself to be expressed in the pursuit for justice. That would be like a husband saying this about his wife: "Well, since I can't do nice things for my wife out a self-giving love for her...I'm just not gonna do anything at all." rather than... "I'm gonna work my butt off and place myself before the Lord so that I can do the nice things I do for her in expressions of genuine love."
See what I'm saying?
Show me some people who are working their butt off and placing themselves before the Lord continually so that they can kill their enemies as an expression of genuine love for them. Please.
Brandon: OK. I know its in the text. But what I'm saying is this. We'll take this scenario again. Imagine walking down the street. Someone pulls a gun out on a little 'ol grandma. Get's ready to blow her brains out. You have the ability to stop them with your gun. The only thing you could do was kill them. But you don't. Why? Because it isn't done out of love. Or even more. Because the principle that life should not be adhered to at all costs is what drives you intuitively. OR because we don't do things simply because they are helpful or beneficial. Or because the Spirit didn't tell you. See the point? This is essentially what you are saying which can be applied to the situation of economics in a third world country. That's all I'm saying. That undermines IMO justice.
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
Post Edited (BBBCanada) : 8/14/2010 9:51:24 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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