ISIS, Christian response and political ignorance

After hearing the number two from the state department make the claim that creating jobs will curb terrorists like those who are part of ISIS I need say something.  Our political leaders in the White House obviously don't understand religious people and certainly not fanatical religious people.  When the White House designated ISIS terrorists as "thugs" they placed them in urban categories that do not apply.  But we can see the connection.  Young men join gangs and become thugs because they don't have strong families and not many opportunities to get out of the ghetto.  One answer is to provide jobs for such young men, if that were possible.  And so the comment by the White House to provide jobs to terrorists is connected to how the White House perceives these terrorists.  But they are wrong!  They are woefully wrong!

In an article you can find here http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/02/what-isis-really-wants/384980/  author Mr. Wood plainly shows that ISIS really believes the claims of Islam and believes they can usher in a new world where Islam dominates.  They believe they are the righteous hand of their god.  Jobs will not change that belief.  And for a young man to have the opportunity to change the world, well, that is what he believes he was made for.

We are in for a long fight if our government continues to consider these terrorists in social and economic terms instead of as a religious group that is trying to usher into the world Armageddon. 

A Christian response: Oh Lord!  Break thou the power of the ungodly and malicious; search out his ungodliness, until thou find none.  Let them be confounded, and put to shame.  Let them be turned back and brought to confusion.  Break their teeth, O God, in their mouths; smite the jaw-bones of the lions, O Lord.  So that man shall say, Verily there is a reward for the righteous, doubtless there is a God that judgeth the earth! In Jesus Name, Amen

Oh, and pick up arms when needed and kill the enemy where he stands!

Problems in the Church

“Where do wars and fights come from among you?” St. James asked the Church.  “You lust and you do not have.  You murder and covet and cannot obtain.”  Sounds pretty bad, but it is nothing new.

Absalom stood at the gate and tried to be the first to influence the people who came to receive justice from his father King David.  Absalom coveted the power and influence and position of his father and so he resorted to backstabbing.

Jeroboam coveted for power, influence and position as well even after authority was given to him by God.  What he had he wanted to hold onto tightly.  He chose to rely on his own strength to remain in power.  And so he sinned.  He changed the worship of the people so that he they would follow new customs and traditions and even a different identity of God.

The same occurs amongst Christians.  A people who are to love one another have leaders who will covet power, influence and position.  And so such men undermine the authority in place.  They establish their own customs hoping for new traditions to be established so as to lead God’s people away from the truth and properly established authority.  Such influencing needs to be called what it is.  It is cowardly!  Men who act in such a manner need to repent and confess their cowardice.  They need to humble themselves under God and under the authority God has placed over them.  That is the only way they can be restored. 

The Two are One

Another example of the Old Covenant being united with the New Covenant is how we enter into both.  Under the Old Covenant a person was first born into the covenant of Abraham and then marked under the covenant by the act of circumcision.  For Christians we too come into the covenant first by birth (must be born again) and then by being marked which is our baptism, which is a circumcision of the heart (Col. 2).