- Sep 27, 2007
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I both agree with you and disagree.
I agree because our deepest and primary struggle against evil is against the evil we find in our own "flesh", in human hearts. The only solution for this is the gospel of Jesus Christ, both in it's initial application when by God's grace we are born again, and then in the long fight for holiness as we grow in Christ through faith by His grace.
I disagree in the sense that what you say is, I feel, a false dichotomy. There is also evil "out in the world". We need to be delivered from evil BOTH in terms of being forgiven, set free, and transformed from our own sin, AND from being attacked and harmed from the sin of others.
Christians in Syria, for example, have suffered very REAL evil in the world. (All of us have, I just chose a particularly obvious example.)
God works through many means. One way He chooses to partially restrain and stop some of the evil in this world is through the right use of government force. In the OP I shared what I view as several HUGE examples of God working in this way.
Grace and Peace, Mark (with Hope and Joy!)
Mark, You have just given the Gospel of men which is no Gospel at all. Where in Christ's Gospel is it stated that we are to be freed from being attacked from others, as a matter of fact, Paul tells Timothy just the opposite, he says, "If you live righteously you WILL be persecuted." And, Christ Himself says, "If they hated the Master they will hate the student." We have no mandate from Christ to change the world but to only preach the Gospel of "real" peace and that because of that we will be rejected by the world. Keep in mind that Roam wanted to release Jesus but it was the religion of that time that demanded that Jesus be crucified. Today it will be no different, the Church will demand that Christians who preach the real Gospel of loving your enemy, turning the other cheek, laying aside carnal weapons, not resisting the evil person, feeding and clothing your enemy, and other similar verses be stopped or killed. And, in that great last war in that big valley in Israel, there will be gathered so-called Christians, along with the world, to do battle with the returning Christ. Doesn't that thought bother you just a little bit? Christ has stated His will and it is not those who read, speak, or talk about that will that are the children of God but rather those who DO the will of the Father. "Be not hearers of the word only but doers of the word. Christ, when He disarmed Peter in the garden disarmed every Christian. This is so easy to understand but virtually no one is obeying it. This too signifies those who travel in the broad-way of the world and refuse to walk in that narrow way.
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