Rules of Engagement – No Rusty Swords

Greetings Dear Reader,

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. – Edmund Burke

When I pass up someone in need I am aiding the enemy.  When I ignore the request of someone for help I am involved in the battle.  I can wage war without even getting off of my couch.  It is so easy to lull my mind into a sense of doing good when I am actually not doing enough. 

In the war of good and evil there are no cease fires.  There is no liberty or shore leave. To forget this is to allow complacency to infect me.  Whether I accept it or not by choosing to follow Christ I have embroiled my life in a war.  I cannot abdicate my involvement in this war without by default aiding the enemy. 

So how do I fight this war?  How do I live in peace and love in a state of war.  It is by loving, being kind, caring for those in need, and abandoning my own self-interests that I wage war against evil.  I need to find my weapons in the heart no the hand.  I need to be good to everyone and see them all as in need of the love that Christ pours on me.

I need to wage war against injustice, hunger, violence, and those considered unimportant by society.  Beyond that I must realize that I fight on another front.  The church has lost much of its credibility and power.  If I do not dissociate my image of following Christ from the political and self-centered nature of the common church then I will not be able to communicate. 

This does not mean that I abandon the church.  Christ did not abandon the corrupt synagogues but rather he challenged them to be what they were meant to be.  I must wage war from within through love and following. 

Christianity stands or falls with its revolutionary protest against violence, arbitrariness and pride of power and with its plea for the weak. Christians are doing too little to make these points clear rather than too much. Christendom adjusts itself far too easily to the worship of power. Christians should give more offense, shock the world far more, than they are doing now. Christian should take a stronger stand in favor of the weak rather than considering first the possible right of the strong. - Dietrich Bonheoffer

Some have abandoned faith or worse only go through the motions of following Christ.  Every moment of not following is a sword stroke for evil, injustice, and darkness.  If following Christ is not central to everything I do then those things that are not following Christ are aggressive acts against him.  There is no neutral ground.  There is no gray.  There is darkness and light; following and not following.  On this battlefield there are no rusty swords.

Wishing you joy in the journey,

Aramis Thorn

Mat 13:52 So Jesus said to them, "That is why every writer who has become a disciple of Christ’s rule of the universe is like a home owner. He liberally hands out new and old things from his great treasure store."