We live in a weaponized society. It’s not only about guns, it’s also about the language we use to weaponize political disagreements, economic and social class differences, consumer marketing gimmicks, and personal relationships of every kind. Good church going people sometimes defend our weaponizing ways with appeals to scripture that praise swords, breastplates, helmets, shields and such. It’s often couched in undertones of confrontation, daring anyone to question one’s right to weaponize whatever is at hand to defend one’s self against perceived threats, real or imagined. When Paul’s letter to the Ephesians comes up, sermons often focus on the armor Paul says we should wear, because it’s what draws the attention of listeners. Everyone wants to know about the armor. What could be more cool than holy armor? Knights Templar will rise again. When the passage from Luke 22 is read (“…the one who has no sword must sell his cloak and buy one.”), it’s taken literally and updated to mean a 9 mm Glock. It can lead to claims of Christian endorsement for the worst of weaponizing propaganda.
We’re so easily distracted by, and attracted to, this kind of stuff that the key message of scripture can get lost. What are the adjectives that describe the armor and weapons? Light, Truth, Righteousness, Peace, Faith, Salvation, Love, Hope, and the indwelling Power of the Holy Spirit. Not what anyone would call knightly armor. Not a Glock in sight. But it’s what Christians are to wear, carry and use as followers of Jesus on the way of love. They’re not weapons of violence and revenge, but tools of godly power to heal, reconcile, and bring a greater measure of godly justice into the world. They’re swords beaten into plowshares, and spears into pruning hooks, so that nations and people shall not lift up sword against each other any more. (Isa.2, Mic.4, and yes I know about Joel 3)
How have we come to such a place that even Christians have fallen into the ways of weaponization that make it so hard too follow Jesus in the way of love? The answer may lie partly in our chosen entertainments. Action movies and tv shows celebrate violent revenge as the epitome of justice that restores equilibrium to the lives of good people. That can be appealing in a time of social and economic upheaval, but it’s justice meted out not by the community’s rule of law, often portrayed as corrupt, incompetent, or cowardly, but by courageous outlaw heroes who wreak total destruction on their enemies. A steady diet of that stuff may inspire the macho posturing of people who believe they are threatened by a rapidly changing world over which they have little control, and which, in their eyes, has left them behind and forgotten.
It inclines them to turn against those most committed to their long term well being, whom they cast as the institutional enemy. Worse, they turn for justice to those who consider them politically malleable, and little more than expendable commodities. Economic, class and racial prejudices make them easy targets for political predators who promise restoration of all they believe they’ve lost. While it’s a phenomenon adhering mostly to the tea party right wing, left wing zealots are not immune. Centrist, right and left, are not above the fray, and too often allow themselves to be passively tolerant.
Following Jesus on a path paved by light, truth, righteousness, peace, faith, salvation, love, hope, and the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit, is also a path that boldly confronts injustice by naming it, and proclaiming what is needed for a more godly way of justice to be had. It’s never an easy path. It can be coopted by persons using Jesus’ name to justify their prejudices and promote their social values. It’s an evolutionary path along which God continues to speak and create. Our ability to understand and absorb what is new is limited, slow to apprehend, and suspicious of being misled. It’s not helpful that we thirst for concrete answers, and God keeps changing both the questions and the answers. It’s a path that will never satisfy political hardliners. It will always make the comfortably complacent, uncomfortable. Speaking only for myself, it’s a path that always ends in doubt before it’s revealed that the end is yet far away, so there’s nothing to do but go on in “faith seeking understanding.”