A
Jihad All Our Own
Jackson Snyder
PREVIEW
Flavius
Josephus, Life of Josephus: Translation and Commentary
PREVIEW
The
History of the Church Eusebius Pamphilus
READ “Redating James” –
Paul’s Vitriolic Commentary on the Epistle of James
READ
The Life and Times of James the Just, Jackson Snyder
READ
Nicknames, Surnames, Aliases:
Exactly Who Were Jesus’ Disciples?
 “The Romans were
not content to simply defeat the Jews.
They pursued a policy of deliberate devastation, eradicating not only
Jerusalem’s central religious institution but the city’s fortifications, public
buildings and large residential quarters.
Those Jews who managed to survive the long siege were later massacred by
Roman soldiers or, in some cases, led into captivity and sold as slaves.” --Hillel Geva regarding the captivity of
Jerusalem in 70 AD.
Lord Jesus Christ, the Master Carpenter of
Nazareth, on a cross through wood and nails you have wrought man's salvation;
wield well your tools in this workshop, so that we who come to you rough hewn,
may by you be fashioned according to your will; for the sake of your tender
mercy. Amen.
George Leonard Carey,
103rd Archbishop of Canterbury
Lessons
Matt 11 12. From the days of John the Baptist until now
the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and men of violence take it by
force.
Habakkuk
1:1. THE ORACLE of Elohim that Habakkuk
the prophet saw. 2. O Yahweh, how long shall I cry for help, and
thou wilt not hear? Or cry to thee "Violence!" and thou wilt not
save? 3. Why dost thou make me see wrongs and look upon trouble?
Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. 4.
So the law is slacked and justice never goes forth. For the wicked surround
the righteous, so justice goes forth perverted.”
2 Corinthians 10:4-8
{read in the course of the message}
Luke 16:14. The Pharisees, who were lovers of money,
scoffed at him. 15. But he said to them, "You are those who
justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts; for what is exalted
among men is an abomination in the sight of God. 16. The law and the
prophets were until John; since then the good news of the kingdom of God is
preached, and every one enters it violently.
17. But it is easier for heaven
and earth to pass away, than for one dot of the law to become void.”
Acts 23:
12. When it was day, the Jews made a plot and bound themselves by an oath
neither to eat nor drink till they had killed Paul. 13. There were more than forty who made this
conspiracy. 14. And they went to the chief priests and
elders, and said, "We have strictly bound ourselves by an oath to taste no
food till we have killed Paul.
Update April 27, 2005 Prophecy News Watch www.prophecynewswatch.com
Could Iran knock out U.S. with 1 bomb?
Iran is not only covertly
developing nuclear weapons, it is already testing ballistic missiles
specifically designed to destroy America's technical infrastructure,
effectively neutralizing the world's lone superpower, say U.S. intelligence
sources, top scientists and western missile industry experts.
The radical Shiite regime has conducted successful tests to determine if its
Shahab-3 ballistic missiles, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, can be detonated
by a remote-control device while still in high-altitude flight.
Scientists, including President Reagan's top science adviser, William R.
Graham, say there is no other explanation for such tests than preparation for
the deployment of electromagnetic pulse weapons – even one of which could knock
out America's critical electrical and technological infrastructure, effectively
sending the continental U.S. back to the 19th century with a recovery time of
months or years.
Iran will have that capability – at least theoretically – as soon as it has one
nuclear bomb ready to arm such a missile. North Korea, a strategic ally of
Iran, already boasts such capability.
Just last month, Congress heard testimony about the use of such weapons and the
threat they pose from rogue regimes.
Iran has surprised intelligence analysts by describing the mid-flight
detonations of missiles fired from ships on the Caspian Sea as
"successful" tests. Even primitive Scud missiles could be used for
this purpose. And top U.S. intelligence officials reminded members of Congress
that there is a glut of these missiles on the world market. They are currently
being bought and sold for about $100,000 apiece.
"A terrorist organization might have trouble putting a nuclear warhead 'on
target' with a Scud, but it would be much easier to simply launch and detonate
in the atmosphere," wrote Sen. John Kyl, R-Ariz., in the Washington Post a
week ago. "No need for the risk and difficulty of trying to smuggle a
nuclear weapon over the border or hit a particular city. Just launch a cheap
missile from a freighter in international waters – al-Qaida is believed to own
about 80 such vessels – and make sure to get it a few miles in the
air."
The Iranian missile tests were more sophisticated and capable of detonation at
higher elevations – making them more dangerous.
Detonated at a height of 60 to 500 kilometers above the continental U.S., one
nuclear warhead could cripple the country – knocking out electrical power and
circuit boards and rendering the U.S. domestic communications impotent.
While Iran still insists officially in talks currently underway with the
European Union that it is only developing nuclear power for peaceful civilian
purposes, the mid-flight detonation missile tests persuade U.S. military
planners and intelligence agencies that Tehran can only be planning such an
attack, which depends on the availability of at least one nuclear
warhead.
Some analysts believe the stage of Iranian missile developments suggests
Iranian scientists will move toward the production of weapons-grade nuclear
material shortly as soon as its nuclear reactor in Busher is operative.
Jerome Corsi, author of "Atomic Iran," told WorldNetDaily the new
findings about Iran's electromagnetic pulse experiments significantly raise the
stakes of the mullah regime's bid to become a nuclear power.
"Up until now, I believed the nuclear threat to the U.S. from Iran was
limited to the ability of terrorists to penetrate the borders or port security
to deliver a device to a major city," he said. "While that threat
should continue to be a grave concern for every American, these tests by Iran
demonstrate just how dangerous the fanatical mullahs in Tehran are. We are
facing a clever and unscrupulous adversary in Iran that could bring America to
its knees."
Last month, the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and
Homeland Security chaired by Kyl, held a hearing on the electromagnetic pulse,
or EMP, threat.
"An electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack on the American homeland, said one
of the distinguished scientists who testified at the hearing, is one of only a
few ways that the United States could be defeated by its enemies – terrorist or
otherwise," wrote Kyl "And it is probably the easiest. A single Scud missile,
carrying a single nuclear weapon, detonated at the appropriate altitude, would
interact with the Earth's atmosphere, producing an electromagnetic pulse
radiating down to the surface at the speed of light. Depending on the location
and size of the blast, the effect would be to knock out already stressed power
grids and other electrical systems across much or even all of the continental
United States, for months if not years."
The purpose of an EMP attack, unlike a nuclear attack on land, is not to kill
people, but "to kill electrons," as Graham explained. He serves as
chairman of the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from
Electromagnetic Pulse Attack and was director of the White House Office of
Science and Technology Policy and science adviser to the president during the
Reagan administration.
Graham told WorldNetDaily he could think of no other reason for Iran to be
experimenting with mid-air detonation of missiles than for the planning of an
EMP-style attack.
"EMP offers a bigger bang for the buck," he said. He also suggested
such an attack makes a U.S. nuclear response against a suspected enemy less
likely than would the detonation of a nuclear bomb in a major U.S. city.
A 2004 report by the commission found "several potential adversaries have
or can acquire the capability to attack the United States with a high-altitude
nuclear weapons-generated electromagnetic pulse (EMP). A determined adversary
can achieve an EMP attack capability without having a high level of sophistication."
"EMP is one of a small number of threats that can hold our society at risk
of catastrophic consequences," the report said. "EMP will cover the
wide geographic region within line of sight to the nuclear weapon. It has the
capability to produce significant damage to critical infrastructures and thus
to the very fabric of U.S. society, as well as to the ability of the United
States and Western nations to project influence and military power."
The major impact of EMP weapons is on electronics, "so pervasive in all
aspects of our society and military, coupled through critical
infrastructures," explained the report.
"Their effects on systems and infrastructures dependent on electricity and
electronics could be sufficiently ruinous as to qualify as catastrophic to the
nation," Lowell Wood, acting chairman of the commission, told members of
Congress.
The commission report went so far as to suggest, in its opening sentence, that
an EMP attack "might result in the defeat of our military
forces."
The EMP threat is not a new one considered by U.S. defense planners. The Soviet
Union had experimented with the idea as a kind of super-weapon against the
U.S.
"What is different now is that some potential sources of EMP threats are
difficult to deter – they can be terrorist groups that have no state identity,
have only one or a few weapons and are motivated to attack the U.S. without
regard for their own safety," explains the commission report. "Rogue
states, such as North Korea and Iran, may also be developing the capability to
pose an EMP threat to the United States and may also be unpredictable and
difficult to deter."
Graham describes the potential "cascading effect" of an EMP attack.
If electrical power is knocked out and circuit boards fried, telecommunications
are disrupted, energy deliveries are impeded, the financial system breaks down,
food, water and gasoline become scarce.
As Kyl put it: "Few if any people would die right away. But the loss of
power would have a cascading effect on all aspects of U.S. society.
Communication would be largely impossible. Lack of refrigeration would leave
food rotting in warehouses, exacerbated by a lack of transportation as those
vehicles still working simply ran out of gas (which is pumped with
electricity). The inability to sanitize and distribute water would quickly
threaten public health, not to mention the safety of anyone in the path of the
inevitable fires, which would rage unchecked. And as we have seen in areas of
natural and other disasters, such circumstances often result in a fairly rapid
breakdown of social order."
"American society has grown so dependent on computer and other electrical
systems that we have created our own Achilles' heel of vulnerability,
ironically much greater than those of other, less developed nations," the
senator wrote. "When deprived of power, we are in many ways helpless, as
the New York City blackout made clear. In that case, power was restored quickly
because adjacent areas could provide help. But a large-scale burnout caused by
a broad EMP attack would create a much more difficult situation. Not only would
there be nobody nearby to help, it could take years to replace destroyed
equipment."
Kyl concluded in his report: "The Sept. 11 commission report stated that
our biggest failure was one of 'imagination.' No one imagined that terrorists
would do what they did on Sept. 11. Today few Americans can conceive of the
possibility that terrorists could bring our society to its knees by destroying
everything we rely on that runs on electricity. But this time we've been
warned, and we'd better be prepared to respond."
We Live in a
Violent World
This last week we witnessed a deplorable
suicide bombing on a public bus in Jerusalem and a truck bombing of the United
Nations headquarters in Baghdad. Scores
of innocent people, including peacemakers and children, were killed; perhaps
hundreds more were maimed for life. We
all had a front row seat to some of the most godless, sociopathic acts in human
history as television cameras were on the scene to catch the gruesome, bloody
horror.
On the local scene, Rev. Paul Hill,
Pensacola’s abortion doctor murderer, is about to be made a martyr for the
cause of violence by his upcoming execution.
When I first moved to Pensacola, this was about the first headline I
saw. I have no love for abortionists. They’re nothing more than murderers for hire
dressed in the deceptive white robes of clerics. However, though a Christian may kill in certain circumstances, he
may never commit murder, no matter how righteous the cause. Those who live by the sword may indeed die
by the sword, even if their sword is the scalpel. Let them see to themselves.
Personally, I’m appalled at our world of
excessive evil. When we were school
children, we never dreamed we’d experience this future world. We were taught about the
sudden nuclear flash, and then the nothingness of annihilation, but not the
slow gruesome death of the human heart that comes as a result of spiritual jihad. Our world is crying out for saviors (Obadiah
1:21). “Send us,” we cry. “Send us on a jihad of our own, O Yahweh: a
crusade against evil: an Armageddon against the Evil one!” Dare we pray in this manner? Yes.
Are there any prayer warriors left?
Yes, there are. Where is the
heavenly hosts we were promised? They
are here.
Yahshua’s
Disciples Violent!
Maybe you didn’t know that our Savior
Yahshua’s world was the model for our own. Not unlike the occupied Iraq of today, Israel was governed by the
Herodian dynasty of kings, whom Israelites generally hated. The Herods were Idumaeans – they were from
the desert far south of Jerusalem – they’d been educated in Rome and had
married Israeli royalty, the last descendents of the Maccabees, gaining favor
through such unions. And, the Herods
were primarily puppets, holding power so long as Rome allowed. The Israel citizenry was therefore
subjugated not only by royal police, but also by a large contingency of Roman
soldiers.
They kept the peace as brutally as they
could. We often think of crucifixion in
the context of Jesus between two thieves – almost as if it were a social
club, with one bloody condemned man casually talking religion or politics
with the other. But tens of thousands
of Israeli patriots and terrorists were crucified for sedition, or beheaded by
Herod for religious extremism.
As Islam has its terror-promoting
organizations, in the first century there were also very influential terrorist
groups that were dedicated to the purification of the temple and the nation by
banishing the Herods, the Romans and any other foreign element. The historian Josephus calls the members of
these violent orders innovators, but we know them today as zealots
and sicarii. In cooperation with
certain temple leaders, these “zealots for violence” would stop at nothing to
cause havoc, including mass homicide and suicide murder.
We know that several of Yahshua’s disciples
had affiliations with terror groups.
Yahuda (Judas) was known as the Sicarii (Iscariot), which means
“murderer” in Latin; he was the high priest’s hit man. Shimon, Yahshua’s brother, who was also one
of his disciples, was known as the Zealot or Cananaean, both
titles affiliating him with a radical group.
We know from Luke 22:38 & 50 that the disciples carried swords, and
that Shimon Kefa lopped off a policeman’s ear.
The Kingdom Taken Violently
Indeed, Yahshua himself said that
Matt 11
12. From the days of John the Baptist
until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and men of violence take
it by force. (see Luke 16:16)
Now, this violence
passage has been difficult to interpret.
But Yahshua explains it in Luke 17:20,21 (literal):
“The kingdom of Yahweh (tou
qeou) comes not amid marvels (meta parathrhsewV) nor will they say, ‘Look (idou)
here or there!’ See here (gar
idou)! The Kingdom of Yahweh is
among you all (entoV `umwn estin).”
He’s talking about himself as the
kingdom! He’s personifying the kingdom
in his own humanity and divinity. Those
who don’t know him will never see the kingdom, whether it drops
out of the sky or is established by force of arms. They can’t see it, because it’s already come -- and ‘it’
is standing right there among them – yet they don’t recognize him /
it. He probably turns to his
friends when he says, “See here!
The Kingdom is among you!”
(The translation we hear the most, especially from
the New Age crowd, is that Jesus said, “The kingdom of god is within you.” This is a very misleading rendition. “Within” should be translated “among.”)
Yahshua / Jesus (the man) died violently as
a political subversive. But they
couldn’t kill the kingdom, because his spiritual children had become the
kingdom in his stead. Yet his holy
kingdom continued to suffer violence. I
want to tell you a little more about the violent who wanted to take it.
Saulus, A Roman Agent
Once upon a time there was a man in Israel
named Saulus – a foreigner from Phoenicia.
He was a secret agent for Rome and was in Jerusalem with the intention
of starting a riot on the temple steps.
His mission was to draw soldiers into the fray and orchestrate bloodshed
there. Saulus’ violent group of
terrorists picked a fight with some peaceniks known as The Way, who
believed that Yahshua of Nazareth, crucified some time back, was the Messiah of
Israel, and would return in avenging power.
Yahqov ha Zadik (James the Just), the crucified man’s brother, was leading
The Way in prayer when Saulus approached
“like a madman, to excite
every one to murder, [Saulus] was saying, ` Why do you hesitate? Oh sluggish and slothful, why do we not lay
hands upon all these fellows and pull them to pieces?' Seizing a strong branding iron from the
altar, Saulus set the example of smiting. Then others were also carried away
with like readiness. Much blood is shed; there is a confused flight, in the
midst of which Saulus attacked Yahqov (James), and threw him headlong from the
top of the steps, supposing him then to be dead."
Recognitions
of Clement, LXX.
This same Saulus,
the violent man with so many connections with both the Herods (Romans
16:11) and the Caesars (Philippians
4:22), soon experienced the end
of his violent days out on The Way to Damascus. His history is recorded in
Acts 9:1-5
excerpts. Now as Saulus, breathing
murderous threats against the disciples of Yahshua, approached Damascus to
arrest any belonging to The Way, suddenly a light from the sky flashed about
him. And he fell to the ground and
heard a voice saying, "Saulus, Saulus, why do you harass me?" And Saulus said, "Who are you?"
And the voice said, "I am the same Yahshua you are harassing.”
We know from his own writings that, soon
after this encounter with the vision, Saulus was driven into Arabia to have a
little tête-à-tête with the “dead” brother of the man he’d thrown down
the temple steps. When he came out of
the desert, he was no longer Saulus, which means “demander of death”; he had
become Paulus, which means, “little guy.”
What a transformation: Saul to Paul.
Here’s more of Paul:
The Little Guy Crashes the Temple
Paul stayed away from Jerusalem and its
temple for fourteen years because the religious folks there were scared to
death of him, others remembered how he’d nearly killed Yahshua’s
brother, still others wanted to murder him as a Roman agent. Before Paul finally returned to Jerusalem,
he’d made friends with Yahshua’s brother, Yahqov, who forgave him for his
assault, and extended the right hand of fellowship (Acts
21:18). Paul brought with him four men from Asia,
followers of The Way, who may or may not have been Jews, we don’t know for
sure. They wanted to worship
publicly in the temple to demonstrate Paul’s change of heart before the
Jews, for he still had a bloody reputation in Jerusalem. Yahqov ha Zadik, now the overseer of The Way
in his brother’s stead, commanded Paul and his friends to be baptized
(purified) in the Jewish manner and shave their heads as a vow of humility
(21:24).
However, Paul had a bad hair day. Even hairless, he was recognized in the
temple as the bloodthirsty Saulus, and the zealots made a sincere attempt to
murder him right there (v.28). They
dragged him and his friends out of the temple, and threw him down the steps,
just as he had done Yahqov years before. A riot ensued, but this time, Paul was the victim rather than the
instigator: he was beaten to a pulp there on the steps before the Roman cohort
could save him. Saulus once did the
beating, but now Paulus was the beaten.
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Paul verses Suicide Killers
I mentioned that there was a violent
movement against foreigners in the land, and sneaking foreigners into the
temple was a serious crime. (Compare
it to Jews entering the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem today.)
Although this sacrilege was sometimes ignored (when
the money was right), stone
signs were posted in various places on the temple grounds warning death to
those who entered unlawfully.
When Paul publicly admitted that he was a
Roman citizen at his arrest (Acts 21:39), he in essence pled guilty to being a foreigner in the temple,
and might lose his head for it. But the
Romans had him now. They were the great
power, like the Americans in Iraq. No terrorist
would touch Paul without a mad, suicidal act of mayhem.
Well, if that’s what it took to get him,
there were plenty of violent religious fanatics ready to volunteer. Forty Sicarii terrorists bound themselves
with a suicide pact – they would neither eat nor drink until they killed
Paul.
Acts 23:14, 15. paraphrase So they went to the chief priests and said,
"We have bound ourselves by an oath to taste no food till we have killed
Saulus. You give notice to the guard to
bring him here as though you were going to examine his case. We’ll kill him in
the courtyard."
But this plot was
thwarted by an informer who warned the Roman cohort, and Paul was saved to go
before Felix, the Governor. The rest of
Paul’s exciting history is yours to read.
Yahqov ha Zadik verses Religious
Fanatics
But what of Yahqov ha Zadik, the brother of
Yahshua Messiah? As it turned out,
Jerusalem, the temple itself, it’s economy, religion, and, yes, the fate of the
entire nation was bound up in the destiny of this one man, whom we know
as James the Just. During Yahqov’s
leadership, The Way prospered in Jerusalem far above expectations. The Spirit of Yahshua was with them. Just before Paul’s arrest, Yahqov had
boasted to him, "You see, brother Paul, how many thousands there are among
the Jews who have believed; they are all zealous for the law...” (Acts
21:20). And Yahweh added to their number each day
such as were being saved (Acts 2:27). But those on The Way
got in the way of the religious elite, who continued to
collect huge taxes, sacrifice animals and orchestrate a form of worship that
was abominable to Yahweh. Those in The
Way were vocal against such deplorable practices.
Three years after Paul was arrested (60
AD), governor Felix was succeeded by Festus.
(Felix = “happy”; Festus = “joyful”!!)
Two years later, governor Festus died; Albinus (“dead
white”) then took over. During the change, a plot formed against
Yahqov ha Zadik. He loudly disapproved
of animal sacrificing – for Yahshua’s final blood sacrifice was to be
the last, the “narrow gate that leads to life” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Yahqov led many to this new understanding, and through the gate to
life. But many others, whose affluence
and positions were threatened, still wanted him dead. (Remember, in his
Epistle, James primarily condemns the rich who oppress the poor.) But
this time, these whitewashed tombs didn’t hire agents like Saulus or terrorists
like Yahuda (Judas) to do their dirty work.
They did it themselves.
Church historian Hegesippus writes
about both the end of Yahqov and the end of Israel:
During Passover (62 AD) the Scribes and Pharisees
attempted to persuade James to dissuade the people from following Jesus. James
was set upon the battlement of the temple where he was interrogated about
"the Gate of Jesus." James answered, "Why do you ask me
concerning the Son of Man? He is sitting in heaven on the right hand of the
great power and will come in the clouds of heaven." Because of this
testimony he was thrown to the ground, stoned, and finally killed by a blow to
the head from the club of a laundryman. His dying prayer was, “I Beseech thee,
O Yahweh, god and Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are
doing.” (Quoted by Eusebius, EH
2:24; see also F. Josephus, Ant 20:9)
His brother, Simon the Zealot, knelt beside him to
hear his final prayer.
Rome verses Terrorists, Despots, Armies and
Religious Fanatics
Ominously, Hegesippus adds, "At once {Roman General}
Vespasian began to besiege them."
Such a riot ensued in Jerusalem at the death of Yahqov, and such
rebellion fomented throughout Israel against the authorities on account of this
holy man’s murder, that General Vespasian and his Roman Legions were
immediately dispatched to Israel, conquering the entire nation in a couple
years, burning Jerusalem, leveling the temple to the ground (in 70 AD) and punishing all the those
connected with terrorism, persecution, corruption and religious militarism. Every single person in Jerusalem was put to
the sword, to the fire or sold into slavery.
(We know this from the
eyewitness account of Flavius Josephus.) When the greatest
military power on earth finally got its gizzard full of troublemakers,
terrorists and religious connivers; it acted swiftly, powerfully and
finally. In hindsight, we see very
clearly that the fate of the nation and its religion was dependent upon the
holy life of Yahqov ha Zadik.
(Jerome
[342-420], in
his Lives, writes, "Josephus records the tradition that this James
was of so great Holiness and reputation among the people that the destruction
of Jerusalem was believed to have occurred on account of his death." In Jerome’s Commentary on Galatians 1:19, he
writes, "So Holy was James that the people zealously tried to touch the
fringes of his garment.")
Historian Eusebius adds an essential note
to our story. Not only did the
followers of The Way refuse to fight the Romans (and thus were
hated all the more by certain Jews),
but when they witnessed armies around Jerusalem, they remembered Yahshua’s
warning:
Matthew
20:20-22. "When you see Jerusalem
surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near. Let those who are in Judea flee to the
mountains and let those who are inside the city depart, for these are days of
vengeance, to fulfill all that is written.”
Eusebius tells us
that the Romans offered a final amnesty so that non-combatants might leave
Jerusalem before it’s destruction. When
the believers in The Way remembered Yahshua’s warning, they heeded it,
took the Romans up on their offer, deserted Judea for the mountains of the East
Bank (Pella), and
were spared by Yahweh from the destroying angels. (Yet all the while, they never ceased their
spiritual jihad against the wickedness that had demeaned their nation.)
Then and Now
You must admit that the situations then and
now are extraordinarily similar. Our
day is just as Habakkuk’s day: “Destruction, violence,
strife and contention rising.” There are still murderous religious fanatics
and militant Zionists armed to the teeth.
There are still Zealots in the form of Islamic jihadists, and sicariian
murderers and homicide killers who do their deeds in the name of some god. There remain monstrous organized death
squads that nations in the Axis of Evil call “armies.” There’s one great, mighty and corrupt power,
like Rome, that could arise like a Kodiak bear and tear the whole messed up
thing apart in a year or two, if it was so inclined. The frightening prophecies of Yahweh’s judgment upon the nations
who spurn his Law are yet to be completely fulfilled (Psalm
2). And there are still those struggling on The Way (now known
as Christians), spared from the violence of this hour, hiding in the
wilderness of Sin(ai) (or Zin. Exodus 16:1), yet fighting the good fight
from a higher perspective.
We get the notion from our little history
that Christians are to be peaceniks and pacifists, who wouldn’t flick a fly,
much less struggle violently in war.
Many Christians are pacifists; they understand that when the
Bible says, “They will learn war no more,” it means there’s just no fight
left. But I want to assure you, my
friends, that some of those who have been deemed pacifists are not. And neither are we. We fight the good fight without ceasing,
though we never lift a sword (but to unbind the captive), a scalpel (except to heal
the wounded) or a shotgun (except
to feed the hungry).
Read with me how Saulus / Paulus instructs
us to make war.
2 Corinthians 10:4-8 (paraphrase
based on the SEV) In our battle we’re not using weapons manufactured in
this world. No, our weapons come from Yahweh. They are powerful enough to
explode the strongest fortified walls.
We destroy strategies and anything else that rises up against what we
know to be true of Yahweh’s will. We capture every thought, and force it into
obedience to Messiah. Since we’ve
obeyed completely, we’re ready to punish lawbreakers.
Don’t look only at what seems true in the
realm of warfare! If we belong to
Messiah, we should think better of ourselves; stronger of ourselves. For Yahweh gave us authority for the
ultimate rebuilding of our world. Even if it means to be guilty of pride, we
won't let anyone defeat us!
Friends, weak or strong, we are fighters,
not quitters. We are prayer terrorists
in the capital of evil, tearing down evil fortresses and building up the
good. We are soldiers of compassion:
action heroes who laugh in the face of danger and joy in setbacks, for we have
confidence in our weaponry -- the mightiest the world has ever seen. Greater than the MOAB (Mother Of All Bombs),
we have the BOAP (Bombs Of All Prayer), giving us the capability of bringing
lasting peace. If only we have the will
to use these sacred weapons! Fellow
soldiers, let’s have us a prayer jihad all our own. Let’s get up on the front lines and blow this godless system of
evil, antichrist and destruction down to Hades, so that those who are even now
being saved might be safe on the narrow path up the mountain road to the city
of Yahweh.
August 22, 2003 |