Kill 'Em part 3
The way to win to the war... is to stop fighting. An eye for an eye leaves everybody blind. We don't overcome evil with more evil. You can't fight fire with fire. Unless and until you understand what the REAL fire is. The fire that is God. The fire that is love. When we stop fighting each other and start loving each other... that's when we win. We destroy our enemies when we make them our friends. We reconcile people to God when we let them know that they are already reconciled. Not by putting religious hoops up for people to jump through, but by showing people who God is by showing people what love is. Not by trying to force Jesus down people's throats and watching them choke on Him... but by showing them a more excellent way. By showing them love. By loving them. Killing them with kindness. And yesterday I said I was going to focus on the idea of killing them ALL, so I guess I better. And, quite frankly, the best verse I can use to make my point is one of the most famous verses in the Bible: "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:16). Two things here. First, God loved THE WORLD. In the Old Testament God had His chosen people, the people of Israel. But the Apostle Paul goes to great lengths to show that while one brach of the olive tree was cut out, it was so that another might be grafted in. That's why Paul took his message to the Gentiles... because it wasn't a member's only club anymore. It was whosoever. It was the Spirit and the bride saying, "Come." And not saying, "Come... or else." But saying, "Come and get it!" Jesus prepared a table in the presence of our enemies, so that anyone--ANYONE--who hungered or thirsted could feast on the six course meal (the Six Steps to the Throne) that was the cross. Revelation 3:20 in the NLT reads, "Look! I stand at the door and knock. If you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal together as friends." Its an open invitation. When Jesus won the war to end all wars (getting rid of any need for any of us to fight anything except the good fight of faith) He did it FOR all of us and He did it AS all of us. "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me" (John 12:32). He was lifted up on the cross. And when He was He drew ALL MEN unto--and into--Himself. He drew us ALL out of Adam and ALL into Himself. All of humanity. You, me, and everybody. See, when Adam was humanity's representative he ate from the wrong tree--the tree of knowledge of good and evil, the tree of death--and on that day he surely died. Which is why before the cross we were all dead in our trespasses and sins. That was the first death. And then when Jesus drew us all into Himself and died, that was the second death. The death OF death when death and hell were thrown into the lake of fire. Which, of course, since God is a consuming fire, meant that we were all drawn into Him. He killed us all with kindness so that whosoever believed (again, the good fight of faith) might not perish, but live. That's why Jesus came: That we might have life, and have it more abundantly. And what makes the abundant life abundant? LOVE. What makes it possible for us to live? Love. How can we "kill" each other with kindness and "win" the war that was already won? Love! We are loved, and that equips and empowers us to love. All of us. Can love all of us!