Transformation, Transformation, Transformation

That is what this is all about. We know biblically that we are all created in the image of God. We know that we are all fallen and are redeemed by the blood of Christ and are being prepared for the New Creation to come (Rev. 21).

The anithesis that has separated us from one another and from God runs through us all, including our enemies. We are all in the same boat. We are all in the need of transformation and must look to the transformation of one another through the love of Christ. That is what it means to be Christlike.

That is why I whole heartedly disagree with Robertson and so many others. We must look to the transformation of our enemies rather than their convenient disposal. When Jesus said love your enemies he meant every word of it.

To deny the opportunity for our enemies to change is to deny ourselves the same opportunity. For we are all capable of atrocity in one form or another. God does not allow his people to live under the law of "Kill or be Killed." In fact, Jesus proved that his way was far more excellent and effective.

Robertson: You're too Eager

When Pat Robertson, the Religious Right leader who sometimes makes me wince when he speaks for so many Christians, said on TV the other day that Hugo Chavez, the President of Venezuela, should be assassinated because of his anti-American ideology, I winced to such an extent my face got stuck that way.

He basically justifies the assassination by saying it would be cheaper to assassinate him now before he becomes a US threat (and obviously he would be because he criticizes President Bush, in which case I am a potential threat to national security because I have also criticized the President) than to wait until Venezuela becomes a launching pad of communism and Muslim extremists and costing us another $200 billion in war costs.

There is the breaking point of the preemptive strike that led us into Iraq. According to the pre-emptive clause we could assassinate somebody else before they even come into power and we would feel ourselves justified. The idea is not only morally corrupt, but it is not freedom, merely paranoid schitzophrenia.

When Bonhoeffer was trying to figure out if God would endorse the assassination of Hitler, he had his own personal war within his heart. He always believed that violence would not be the answer, but the consequences of Hitler dying before his height of power are far from negative. Millions would be saved. But even then the decision was not obvious for Bonhoeffer. It really was personal distress to come to the realities of war.

I do not see the same struggle in Mr. Robertson. In fact, he is willing to take one life because of the financial burden it would become to do it later. What kind of unbiblical, un-Christlike comments are those? Please Mr. Robertson, What Would Jesus Do?

I still have to believe in transformation. Not only for the sake of this planet, but for my wincing face as well.

Uganda: Forgiveness or Violence

This post concerns Dateline NBC's Children of war in Uganda as seen on Aug.21, 2005. The link to Dateline's website is provided. Children of Northern Uganda flee in the late afternoons to Gulu to avoid being abducted by Kony's army. Up to 25,000 children sleep in Gulu every night and over 9,000 children have been abducted in the last 12 months. This photo was taken by Marcus Bleasdale.

There is a name of a charismatic leader who has committed atrocities beyond the comprehension of our American minds. His name is Joseph Kony. He claims to be the voice for God and he crushes the spirit of children to gain their allegiance. He and his cronies capture families and in a indescribably deprived ritual will kill the father before the eyes of the children. Then they will mutilate the mother but stop before she is dead. Turning to the children they demand that they kill there own mother or be killed themselves.

By the time the act is over the children, sometimes as young as 8 or maybe even younger have committed two atrocities that will wipe out hope from their lives as they are introduced to a new darkness in the civil war in Uganda as Kony's soldiers. Not only will the kids feel guilty...no, damned for the murder they will lose all hope of redemption in the life to come because they have offended their ancestors and according to the African worldview, ancestors are often the only hope they will ever have.

There are two major fighters in this war who are focused on saving the children. Rev. Sam Childer runs an orphanage in Uganda and is a born again, bible believing Christian who waits for the day to confront Kony face to face. When asked about the confrontation, Childer simply says he will win. He carries a pistol wherever he goes, a loaded rifle on his lap when driving through suspect territory and brags about when he was growing up he loved to fight. I have nothing but respect for him, for not turning a blind eye to the horrors of what Kony is doing and for saving the lives of countless children in a land devoid of hope after a 19 year long civil war.

But then there is Angelina Acheng Atyam. Her own daughter was abducted by Kony's Army. But she believes there is no way for Kony to ever make restitution for his atrocities, he has simply caused to much pain to make up for himself. All she asks is for him to stop, to ask for forgiveness and she will give it to him. She acknowledges she would be trading justice for peace, but then at least so many lives could be spared either from death or the pain of losing the people they love.

Kony's army even offered her her daughter back in exchange for her silence and she refused. Not because she did not love her daughter, but because she knew she was only one of thousands who had the same pain and so asked, "What about them?" Later her daughter would escape and they would be reunited.

In such brutality I begin to wonder if a nonviolent movement against the civil war would actually work against someone like Kony. I don't know. What I do know is that nonviolence would be the path that remained most faithful to God's call if, and only if, it was not mistaken as an excuse to do nothing. Courage and transformation can take place, and it can happen even when the revolution is nonviolent.

Please pray for Uganda and Rev. Childer and especially the message of peace that Angelina brings to a nation that has forgotten the word.

Penetrating the Abyss

My Traitor's Heart by Rian Malan is a book that chronicles many of the horror stories that occurred in South Africa under the Apartheid regime. Though often disturbing, the book really chronicles how awful humanity can really be toward one another.

The purpose for this post, however, is about how brutal Africans were toward one another during the political unrest in South Africa in the mid to late 80's. Though no blame can be taken from the Apartheid regime for they created the system which divided African families, it was unnerving to find that Africans were directly responsible for triple the amount of deaths than Afrikaners during the unrest. The mutilations, torture and anger that seethed in the skin of all of South Africa should be a warning to all people of what we are capable of as human beings.

All over the continent of Africa there is civil war, violence, rape and a brutality unmatched in most places of the world today. But we would be mistaken to believe that that spirit of division and violence is "over there" on the Dark Continent. No, it is within us all.

When we fail to realize this single point or even fail to act upon the recognition, forgiveness is forgone, a mercy drought occurs and love is hindered by the blame we place on "the other" for our pain.

But to recognize that we are in need of the same grace our enemy needs, that we need forgiveness as much as "the other" and that "the other," no matter how appalling their crime, is our brother and/or sister we will begin to learn what it means to love like Christ and that love will penetrate the darkest abyss.

The Violence Within Us

Lately I have been reading Walter Wink's Jesus and nonviolence: A Third Way. As I was reading it Wink makes a wise decision in making the reader examine himself with the understanding that as much as we hope to fight violence with nonviolence we cannot forget that violence is within us all as a result of the fall and to fail to recognize our own darkness from within we will risk becoming self-righteous.

I suppose we would be like the Pharisees having abided by the written law but really being white washed tombs and dead.

Please, YHWH, keep us from becoming self righteous in our quest for your justice to reign in the hearts of all people. May we come to the cross, may we follow you through the fires but may we always do so not by our might or even our will but by your Holy Spirit. In Jesus name, Amen.