We, in the Dallas area, are dismayed. Eleven police officers shot, five killed, by someone like me, a former combat arms veteran.
Yes, we are a nation of guns and violence, and yes, black male Americans are shot more often than others, and often, for seemingly, no just cause. Now we whites have a chance to feel as vulnerable as our black fellow citizens have felt for many years.
What do we do when both white and blacks feel vulnerable to unwarranted violence against them?
Frank Bruni in a solid op-ed for the New York Time answered,
Great ideas, but they don’t deal with the fundamental problem causing indiscriminate violence in our society and indeed, every society.
We need to remember the only power on the earth that always causes murderers and those that would abuse their authority to become true lifesavers is the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Saint Paul was a murderer who became a life-giving martyr.
Acts 26 9 “I myself was convinced that I ought to do many things in opposing the name of Jesus of Nazareth. ... I not only locked up many of the saints in prison after receiving authority from the chief priests, but when they were put to death I cast my vote against them.
Paul cast his vote to kill innocent people.
12 “In this connection I journeyed to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests. 13 ...I heard a voice saying to me ...,‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’ 15 And I said, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ And the Lord said, ‘I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.
At this moment Paul was transformed from a vigilante to one who was willing to lay down his life for others. He became one sent to open their eyes, so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God.
Only Christ turns us from the power of Satan, the murderer, to God, the life-giver.
Through the pain, God can work a greater good than we imagine.
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today. Genesis 50:20
Wrongful deaths are horrible but we need to use them to embolden us Christians to assert that public order only comes from inner morality. I believe people are more open to listen to the Gospel when the world doesn't make sense any longer, when they see seemingly normal people do atrocious things, as we witnessed in Dallas, and as Muslim terrorists attack, and as police misuse their authority. Public discourse needs to be about looking to Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith and to teach all men, especially the police, I John 3:15, 16, Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. We must hold the police accountable to not asserting their rights before man, but their moral responsibility to protect all lives, especially the lives of the poor and African Americans, before God. And we need to change policies of all police forces to reflect God's standards in this area, as Bruni said above. Many of our policies in police forces simply give flawed human beings too much leeway to shoot another man for no reason.
This is a time for boldness about the Gospel in public and about how the true Gospel calls us to lay down our lives for others, not protect our lives at the expense of others, to be like Jesus. A policeman being allowed to shoot a 12 year old black boy with a toy gun with impunity for any reason is a disgrace before God and man. I do believe if that child would have been white, either the policeman would never have shot, or he would be accused of murder.
God intends the source of healing for our nation’s wounds to be the same source that will heal the whole world.
And he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised. 2 Corinthians 5:15
God intended the death of His only Son to cause people from every nation, race and tongue and religion to no longer live for themselves, but for Christ.
Even as we reel in shock at mass murders, especially of our public servants, and as we mourn our dead of every race and repent of our own national sins, the death of Christ urges us to remember how needy are the nations that have rarely tasted justice and healing.
Here is the latest on the travesty on a massive scale in Russia:
Pray for America and for the nations to look to God alone to heal the whole world for His glory.
Blake Purcell