Why do many (most? almost all?) Christians believe that it can be right for Christians to go to war?

Almost no one would say that they like or want war.

Yet, given certain circumstances, most people, including it would seem most Christians, would nevertheless say that it can be right to go to war. There are a couple of types of situations that are usually regarded as being sufficient for legitimately engaging in warfare.

Firstly, people feel that invasion by a foreign power, and perhaps even the high likelihood of such an invasion, warrant the taking up of arms. Secondly, and less commonly, if many people in another country are suffering terribly under unjust and cruel authoritarian rule, that may be regarded as sufficient warrant for an armed intervention. (It is also true that countries go to war simply in order to advance their own interests but, nowadays, this would not necessarily have overt popular support.)

Does actual or imminent invasion justify going to war?

For most people the answer would appear to be so obvious that it barely deserves talking about. If some enemy is intending to invade my country and presumably take over or destroy my way of life, quite possibly injuring or killing me and those I love in the process – of course we must fight to try and prevent that from happening. Failure to fight would definitely be completely irresponsible and probably also cowardly and irrational.

No one has the right to hurt and kill us or to take what we have worked hard for. Given what human nature is like, the strong always take from the weak so we cannot be weak or we will be walked over and suppressed. Therefore a strong military is needed and we must be prepared to use force when necessary.

Right?

Now, that would appear to be a perfectly rational approach to take – at least for someone who is not a believer in God: but is it equally valid for those who claim to be followers of Jesus?

If a person believes: • that they have just this one opportunity to experience and enjoy life; • that with death comes complete, eternal nothingness; • that they have no overriding responsibility toward their invading enemies; • that there is no one greater than and beyond this physical universe who cares for them; why shouldn’t they do everything possible to try and ensure that their life is as long and fulfilling for themselves and their loved ones as they can make it? If that means having to go to war to try and ensure those ends, then surely, so be it.

But what if a person believes: • that this life is not the end of everything; • that after death we will either be in God’s loving presence or separated from God; • that we are to love our enemies; • that God does know and care about us right now; should such beliefs cause our attitude to war to be different to that of the unbeliever?

When people fight to stop invaders they are fighting to preserve their own lives, the lives of their families, friends, neighbours and fellow countrymen, and for their freedom, their property and their way of life.

The unbeliever in God will usually fight to save his or her life if it is under threat, which is quite a reasonable response given their perspective. After all, if they lose their life, they believe that is the end of everything for them, forever. In contrast the Christian does not believe that their life ends if they are killed (John 11:25). Rather, the believer in Christ will enter eternal life (John 3:16) in the presence of God, where there will never again be tears or suffering (Revelation 21: 3-40). The unbeliever though, is condemned (John 3:18).

The unbeliever will, again quite reasonably, fight to protect his/her freedom. If their country is invaded, restrictions of one degree or another would most likely be placed upon them by the occupying power. Their freedom to live as they would want could be majorly curtailed. The Christian however knows the only freedom that truly counts (John 8:31-32, 36) and this can be so whatever the circumstances of their life (Romans 8:37-39). This freedom is not obtained by fighting with guns (II Corinthians 10:3-4) but by what Christ has done for us through his death and resurrection (I John 4:9-10).

The non-Christian will fight to retain their possessions and property. Whether they have worked hard for what they have or whether they have inherited it, what they have is theirs and they do not accept that anyone can just take their possessions from them. The Christian’s treasure is in heaven (Matthew 6:19-21) and what they do have in this world is for use in the service of God and others (Matthew 25:34-36). If the Christians’ worldly possessions should be taken from them it is not a disaster because they have better possessions (Hebrews 10:34). God knows what their needs are (Matthew 6: 31-33) and helps those who call upon him (I John 3: 21-22).

The unbeliever will fight to keep their country. It is their homeland and invaders have no right to try and take it for themselves. Followers of Christ believe that this present broken world (Romans 8:22) is not their home (Philippians 3:20); rather, they are aliens and strangers in this place (I Peter 2:11). They are already in a real sense in the kingdom of God (Luke 17:21) and Jesus said his kingdom is not of this world (John 18:36).

The unbeliever regards the invader as their mortal enemy and is prepared to kill them in order to defeat them. Jesus told those who would be his disciples to love their enemies, to do good to those who hate them, to bless those who curse them, and to pray for those who mistreat them. (Luke 6:27-28) They are to give food and water to their enemies if they are hungry and thirsty. (Romans 12:14, 20).

But regardless of what the Bible says, the prospect of not defending ourselves and our property from an invading enemy seems too awful to be taken seriously, even for the Christian. How could we simply allow others to come into our country and take over, as surely would eventually happen once it became known that we would not fight to stop that happening?

The reality however is, we do not know what would happen should Christians, en masse, refuse to fight. There never has occurred a situation where the whole population of a country was completely committed to following Jesus and the people refused to engage in warfare.

This is not to suggest that if all the people of a nation sincerely trusted God that that would ensure that other countries would not attack them, not at all. Rather, it is simply to say that we do not know from historical precedent what would happen and neither can we presume about what might happen in the future should Christians not fight. Perhaps God would keep them from invasion and harm, perhaps not.

But for the Christian, should their country be invaded, that would not be the end of the world. Yes, life could quite likely become very, very unpleasant and very difficult under an occupying power: many lives may be lost, property destroyed, possessions taken, families broken up, and persecution of the Christian community instituted. How could this be allowed to happen if fighting may have prevented it from occurring?

The reality is though that we can never know in advance that fighting will prevent a country being defeated and occupied. Of course a country may decide to expend enormous amounts of money, resources and human effort to establish itself as the world’s greatest military super-power and thereby try to make itself invulnerable to attack. That apparent invulnerability may however be illusory; the price paid to try and achieve it may be completely immoral and counter-productive; and for almost all countries it would be an impossibility even to try to achieve that anyway.

More importantly though, Christians have to address the question of what their responsibilities, as Christians, are in this world.

• What is the extent of the responsibility that Christians have toward their own nation, specifically in relation to warfare? Few Christians would argue that it is right for Christians to fight for countries that engage in wars of outright aggression such as that carried out by Germany in WWII. Most Christians though would say it is right for Christians to fight against such aggressors.

While there may be a number of legitimate responsibilities, such as paying taxes, that a Christian has as a consequence of being a citizen of a country, can a Christian rightly be required to kill for his/her country? When a person is killed their life on earth is over. Some may believe that they will be reincarnated, others believe that with death comes complete nothingness. Christians though, as noted above, believe that after death people either enter into a full, loving relationship with God or they are separated from God, all depending on their response to God during their time on earth.

Thus when a person is killed in warfare they go to their destiny. This is not meant to infer that should a Christian kill an invader in warfare that they are in any way responsible for the other person’s standing before God. No, each of us is responsible for our own lives. But it is the case that the Christian’s actions in such an instance directly end the invader’s life on earth. If at the point of death that person was not a Christian they would be separated from God. (And if they were a Christian, what an unspeakable madness for Christians to be killing fellow Christians.)

If on the other hand the invaders were not killed, then, it is possible that at some point they may come into right relationship with God. Can the protection of one’s country from invasion be a greater value than the possible destiny of one or more human lives?

(It should be noted in passing that probably the majority of the present inhabitants of many countries, perhaps all countries, are there following an earlier generation, more or less forcefully, taking the country from other occupants: e.g. USA, Australia, Japan, England, etc. That being so, is it coherent to refer to “our” country?)

• What responsibility though do Christians have toward the citizens of the country they live in, during warfare? The lives of our friends and neighbours and fellow countrymen are at risk during war – and Christians are explicitly told to love their neighbours - so shouldn’t we fight to help them? If it is argued, as above, that the possible destiny of an enemy’s soul trumps fighting to hold onto one’s land, this same enemy may be intent on killing one’s neighbours and one’s neighbours may be no more ready to stand before God than are the enemy. Therefore it would seem to be valid to kill the enemy before they kill my neighbour.

It is true that both the neighbour and the enemy may not be right before God. The crucial question here though is, just who is my neighbour? Jesus clearly taught in the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:29-37) that everyone is our neighbour, including our enemies. It is quite understandable that we will naturally have a preference for those whom we may know and who are more like us, compared to an unknown, frightening enemy who is out to harm us. And there is no denying that in warfare enemies can be monstrous in their conduct, making them completely unlovable. (It can’t be denied that “our side” too has been guilty of such things.) By God’s grace though the impossible can be made possible, especially when we remember that God does not want anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance (II Peter 3:9). The Christian must seek what is best for both enemy and friend, doing all he/she can to see that neither is killed and both are helped.

• Surely though, one’s responsibility to one’s family is absolute. If an enemy is about to kill one’s spouse, child or parent, and if the only way to save them is to kill the enemy first, one is morally obliged to do so. Does not Paul say that if a person fails to provide for their immediate family, he denies the faith and is worse than an unbeliever? (I Timothy 5:8) If that is so, then how can one fail to fight to protect them?

Yes, a person should be very diligent in providing for and protecting their family, but this requirement is not absolute. If a family were in a lifeboat with two men who were hoarding all the food, the parents would not be justified in murdering the men in order to get the food for their starving children. The early Christians could have saved their families from ghastly death in the Roman arenas if they had denied their faith, but they rightly refused to do so.

Sometimes certain death, even the death of one’s loved ones and oneself, as tremendously difficult and painful as that would be, may be the only option the Christian can rightly accept. Christians can confidently entrust their children into the hands of a loving God and thus refrain from killing even their mortal enemy. By God’s grace it may even be that we could get to enjoy eternity in God’s presence alongside that (repentant) enemy. What Christian would not rejoice at that outcome?

What would life be like today if Christians had not fought against Hitler? The fact is, we don’t know. It is tempting to assume the worst, and quite possibly the worst may have happened. Life today may have been far more difficult for many more people than it is – but it may not. Perhaps Hitler may have become a Christian – maybe if he had seen Christians standing uncompromisingly alongside the Jews, even to the point of going to the gas chambers with them. We cannot know either way. But while resorting to the gun may seem to help, we have every reason, when we look at God’s wider concerns, to believe that it does not.

(The Israelites engaged in warfare as recorded in the Old Testament – does that indicate that it can be right to fight? There is no parallel however between the very particular situation of the Israelites occupying the promised land and the present situation under the new covenant. The followers of Christ do not constitute an earthly nation and Christians have not been promised any land in this present world (Matthew 8:19-20).)

Followers of Jesus must take his words seriously. Jesus said that everyone who wants to be his disciple must take up their cross daily and follow him (Luke 9:23- 24). The cross had only one purpose – it was an instrument for execution. To follow Jesus then, is to live with the daily expectation that one will be killed for doing so. That may not happen but it should not be a surprise if it does. If Christians refuse to fight in wars, then yes, there may be much suffering and death. But even in the midst of that, God may also be seen to do great things as his people give their lives in love rather than try to take the lives of their enemies.

In conclusion then, why should Christians think it ever right to engage in warfare?

Along with God, Christians should want everyone to come to repentance. If Christians kill their enemies that means they will not be able to repent. If the Christian is killed though, they go to a glorious eternity with God. Yes, there is sorrow and difficulty for those left behind, but there is no comparison between the possible loss of a soul and the relatively brief suffering experienced in this world.

Anyone can take up arms to protect what they care about, and most people do just that when they are threatened. (Why should the non-Christian think there is anything special about the Christian’s beliefs if the Christian resorts to use of the gun just as the non-Christian does?) But the Christian is to be different: we are explicitly told to follow the example of Christ:

“... if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.

‘He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.’

When they hurled insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered he made no threats. Instead he entrusted himself to him who judges justly.” (I Peter 2:19(b) – 23)

Jesus did not strike out physically at his enemies but rather he loved them, even to the extent of dying for them (Romans 5:10). His followers are required to follow in his steps.

Graham Preston prestons@prestonlife.com