Published February 4, 2008

By Scott E. Sundberg

“That just really doesn’t work in the real world.”  

That pretty much summed up how a sibling responded to my perspectives on pacifism. Sure, they were great ideas, and Jesus, in whom she fully believes, touted them. Yet really those ideas just don’t work when one looks at the world as it really is. 

And you know, logically and viscerally—deep, deep down in your gut—she is right. There appear to be threats and terrors on every side. Realistically, if we are to survive, we have to fight back with force, lethal if necessary. It’s unavoidable. It may seem a bit Machiavellian—the end justifies the means—but that is just how the world is.  

And yet I have to ask, as Christians, is our reality the same as it is for everyone else? Is not our perspective of reality somehow a bit different? Does not faith itself, and the gospel message, change reality? 

In the real world the blind never see, the deaf don’t get the chance to hear, the leper stays an outcast, the lame never walk or leap. Nor do men dead for three or four days rise from the dead.  

As Christians, followers of Christ, our reality is found in Christ[1], and with Christ, all things are possible.[2]  

I come from a tradition and background wherein I thought that violence and war were basically defendable. I would point to the Old Testament and to a select few New Testament passages as examples. So it was a bit odd that my wife and I decided to join a peace church—a church that traditionally espoused nonviolence and pacifism. I remember our liking basically everything about the church, but this whole peace thing, well, we just didn’t get it. 

Thus began casual conversations with people in that church. We were not desiring to any extent to become pacifists, we felt secure and could justify where we stood on the issue. But we were curious, how did these people, who otherwise seemed so rational, educated, and biblical rationalize their peace position?  

Over lunch I recall asking the lead pastor if he was a pacifist, and he said with encouraging honesty, “I am on my way.” In another conversation I asked an associate pastor if he had been able to justify his peace position based on the New Testament, especially Jesus and Paul. He replied, “That is exactly how I came to my peace position, not from some extra-biblical sources but precisely through the scripture.”  

I decided it was time to begin rereading my New Testament in an attempt to see if I could make heads or tails out of these novel-to-me beliefs. 

First and foremost I started with Matthew, of course. I looked at the life, the teachings, the words of Christ. I challenge anyone to really read the book of Matthew and look for issues of peace and justice. 

It has always been an issue for both Christians and the church to answer what it means to be in the world but not of the world. The writer of Romans said it pretty succinctly when he wrote, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”[3]

The way of the world is pretty obvious to everyone. And a major part of Christ’s message was to bring something different, something not of this world, something, well, new. Something that was even new for the children of Israel who already believed in his father.

In Matthew 5 Jesus starts out with, “You have heard it was said.” He is saying, this is the way you have been taught to believe. “Love your neighbor and hate your enemies.” That is reality, that is how the world works, accept it, we might say. Yet that is not acceptable in Jesus’ reality.

He continues, “But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven…If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”[4]

Is Jesus serious? Do you think he really means it? Should we read this literally? I’ve had to ask myself, if what Jesus says is true, then my reality needs to change.

How I as a follower of Christ act and react in this reality needs to be different from the world. The gospel of John in chapter 13 qualifies this even more, Jesus says, “A new commandment I give you: Love one another.” As I heard one pastor say, for Jesus the whole law can be summarized like this: Love God; love everyone else. This is something new, some different from the usual understandings of what reality should be.

John D. Roth writes, “At its heart, Christian faith points toward a transformed understanding of reality itself. In Christian language, repentance or conversion implies a fundamental ‘turning around.’ It begins with a recognition that our natural ways of making sense of the world are deeply skewed, and it calls us to reorient our entire perspective in the new light of Christ’s living, transforming presence in the world… Christian faith implies a fundamental change in our worldview—a realignment of our deepest understandings and assumptions regarding the nature of reality and, consequently, a new way of living that corresponds to this formulated perspective.”[5] 

Being committed to nonviolence I have been called a number of things. A more common (and one of the less painful) is foolish. I obviously don’t have my head in reality. Can’t I see how the world really works? Well, the way of Christ is foolishness to the world. Paul wrote, “But we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles…For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.”[6]  

Where does our reality, as Christians, rest? Our faith? It should not be founded on the wisdom of men and women, but on God and his power alone. “We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we speak of God's secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began.”[7]

God’s way, hence Christ’s way—love your enemies—does not make sense to the world. It seems foolish. It also seems weak. But I have to ask, where exactly is our trust? In military might? National identity? Economic fortitude? Superior systems? Government and even ourselves?

The Psalmist wrote, and many of us have sung a song based on this, “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God.”[8]

A challenge for us Christians is that we still have an attitude of self preservation at all costs. It’s our natural tendency. We are told and conditioned to believe that if we do not defend our lives then we are foolish, our heads are in the clouds. The logical conclusion, however, is then that our preservation becomes more important than that of someone else. In violent situations, war being the apex of conflict, it comes to my survival or the life of another person. Which will I choose? In the real world, I choose my own.

Is that the message of scripture? Is that the message of Christ? Roth writes, “Christians offer a response that does not differ in any significant way from what one might expect to hear from modern non-Christians… Our own lives must be preserved at all costs even if it means forfeiting the life of someone else, presumably that of a non-Christian.”[9]

The message of scripture is quite different. Christ spoke to the concept of self-preservation when he called the crowd along with his disciples and said: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it.”[10] The way of the cross shows no tendency toward self-preservation, no attempt of self-defense. The cross means sacrifice, not preservation. This is another example of other-worldly realities. To the world, again, this is foolishness.

I believe it was Oliver Cromwell who once said, “Trust in the Lord, but keep your powder dry.” In that statement there is no real trust. Or perhaps it plays again with the idea of self-preservation. I the individual must survive no matter what, perhaps even if the Lord does not will it. By this I mean we take our preservation into our own hands, not God’s.

Is the Lord not capable of protecting us? Or fighting for us?

Job in arguing before his supposed friends declares, “Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him.”[11] Even if the Lord does not save me, yet will I still believe. And the cohorts of Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, who went against rules of the state so as to fully follow God, stated to King Nebuchadnezzar before he had them thrown into the fiery furnace, “We do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter… If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”[12]  

There is no guarantee of our physical survival if we follow God. He may not save us physically. He may, but he may not. The important thing, even at the cost of our lives, is to follow God, not the kingdom of this world, or worship and serve the things of this world.

And so the effects of this new reality then also have significance to our loyalties, I dare say, even our allegiances. Our supreme ruler becomes none other than King Jesus, to whom all of our loyalty is due.

In writing to the church at Philippi, Paul tells how for many, one might even assume professing Christians, “Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.”[13] 

Earthly things, things of this world, should not be our main concern. Another way to say this would be that the world should not shape our perception of reality; our earthly citizenship is nothing compared to that of our loyalty and citizenship to the kingdom of Heaven. And, we are in joint citizenship with other believers across the world, “For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit. Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone.”[14]

No other kingdom, no other reign, no other state or loyalty should trump our citizenship in Christ’s kingdom. We are citizens with others, from other lands and nations. In God’s kingdom there is not nationality, no other citizenship. “For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.”[15]

Simply stated, there can be no national borders for those of us who are in the kingdom of Christ. The only borders that are a part of our new reality are those between the earthly kingdom and the kingdom of heaven. And even there, for us, we do not fight battles that are recognized by the powers, the governments of this world. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”[16]

Here we see that there is indeed a just war for Christians to be a part of. But it is not a war of this world, of earthly kingdoms and governments against other earthly governments and kingdoms. This is not a just war theory invented by Augustine to justify being part of a warring Rome. No, our loyalties as to whom we should fight for get confused by the voices trying to call us to a worldly reality, one of mixed allegiances.

For the follower of Christ, the Prince of Peace, oddly, there are battles, but they are not physical. And in fact we are told how to arm ourselves. Ephesians 6 tells us to put on the full armor of God, but it is not a physical armor. We as Christians are never told to take up the physical sword. Peter himself is told to lay down his sword.[17] Instead we read that we should put on a belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, a shield of faith, helmet of salvation, and the sword of the spirit. We will be lured and tempted to fight the world’s battles, but we should stand firm then with our “feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.”[18] Our strength is not to be found in horses and chariots, but we should “be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.”[19]

Our assumptions and perspectives of reality are naturally shaped by the world around us. History, tradition, loyalties, fears and culture shape our perspectives. “Like a fish in water, we are often so immersed in our basic assumptions about the nature of reality that we can scarcely recognize those outside forces that are actively shaping our understanding of how the world works.”[20]  

But should not the greater influence, as Christians and followers of the Prince of Peace, be the life and teachings of this Prince, ruler of the kingdom in which we are citizens?  

In the new reality that is found in Christ I must look at the world around me and ask, what cause is worthy of my blood? My sons’ blood? Political freedom? Democracy, a concept that originates from ancient Greece? The overthrow of a foreign government, or any government based on the ideas and goals of flawed humans? Capitalism? Only one cause do I feel is worth my life, that of my sons, or anyone else’s sons and daughters, wives, brothers, fathers, sisters and mothers: the cause of Jesus Christ, and it finds no foundation in a worldly kingdom, for his kingdom, as he himself said, is not of this world, if it were, we would be physically fighting, but Christ’s servants did not, should not.[21]  

John Howard Yoder writes, “No one created in God’s image and for whom Christ died can be for me an enemy, whose life I am willing to threaten or to take, unless I am more devoted to something else—to a political theory, to a nation, to the defense of certain privileges, or to my own personal welfare—than I am to God’s cause: his loving invasion of this world in his prophets, his Son, and his church.”[22] 

“Nothing—not Caesar or the American flag or the principles of democracy or the Western Tradition—transcends the call of Jesus to love our enemies.”[23]

We live, and seem to have always lived, in a world where the response to violence is more violence. When evil occurs, we strike back, we take revenge. And yet we are commanded to, as far as it depends on us (not the world, not the government, but we ourselves) to live at peace with everyone. Revenge and retribution is not ours to take, but instead we are asked to leave that to God, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay.” In fact we are told to act contrary to those notions of revenge and eye-for-an-eye real-world responses. If our enemy is hungry, do what? Feed him. If our enemy is thirsty, give him a drink.[24] In other words, don’t kill him. Rather, tend to him, care for him, or her.

That is the new reality we are called to as followers and servants of Christ. It may not make sense in the so-called real world, but that is not the point, it is the life we are called to in this new reality that is Jesus Christ.

_____

Scott Sundberg is the director of communications for Mennonite Disaster Service, based in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.