This topic is humbling. This topic is timely, but still no fun.

This topic grates against us in a season when war lingers long after the early explosion of conquering force that brought Iraq under US and UN control. Now, as peace and order seem elusive, and as lives (even American lives) continue to be lost, we grow weary of war and fuzzy about the particulars that drove us to war. Our temptation is always to pull back into at least emotional isolation, if not political isolationism.

Still it is good to talk about these things. It's good for us to overcome our weariness and to keep our proneness toward apathy at bay. For Christians, for anyone, it's good to know how to think about war and peace.

Remember that the goal of this series is to help us learn together how to think on hard issues, more than what to think about them. First and mostly, we want to think biblically, if we believe that scripture is a reliable and authoritative help with these deep and tough questions.

As we look at scripture, it's easy to see the differences between Old and New Testaments in regard to war and peace. In the Old Testament, wars frequent the faith history of Israel. War is foisted on Israel. Israel makes on war on others. Some of the stories are graphic and grisly.

In the New Testament, there's not much talk about war. Spiritual warfare, yes. Some skirmish in the ranks of Christian churches, yes. But not much solider talk. Why, I wondered is the Old Testament so loaded with war, and the New Testament so quiet about it?

For some people, this one troubling dimension of the Old Testament keeps them almost always in the New Testament. Why is the Old Testament so violent?

Most obviously, in the Old Testament, Israel is a national theocracy - God is king. Governance and faith are bound up together in the story of a people who are trying to keep God on the throne. Yes, they have human agents (patriarchs, judges, kings) doing governance. But the story of faith is completely interwoven with matters of the law, the defense of borders, acquiring land and promoting God instituted cultural values in a hostile environment. In the Old Testament, the faith heroes are national leaders who have the dual challenge of maintaining authentic faith and projecting faith into the political scene. That means war, sometimes especially since the drama of war and international conflict is often the stuff of recorded history - even faith history. David, warrior, minstrel, poet, and king will always be remembered as the greatest king. His faith and courage in battle cannot be pried away from who David is.

In the New Testament, we have a totally different scene. Governance is in the hands of someone else altogether - the Roman Empire. Not, by the way, a democracy. Christianity is a politically powerless smattering of churches taking form and finding a place in an environment that is both tolerant and harsh. Rome is tolerant of all gods and harsh on anyone rebellious enough to claim only one God. Christians suffered martyrdom in Roman coliseums not because they believed in Christ, but because they believed that Christ was the living revelation of the One True God. So the only skirmishes we read about in the New Testament are the abuses leveled on early believers, who had no nation to govern, no laws to enforce, no borders to defend, no soldiers to necessarily police or protect.

Frankly, many simplistic notions of pacifism, in my opinion, are based on the New Testament narrative that is so lacking in war speak. I assure you, if Peter and Paul, James and John, had been asked to shepherd the church and govern the nation, their stories would read a lot more like the stories of Moses and Joshua, David and Solomon. I'm glad, frankly that they didn't have to.

That being said, both the Old Testament and New Testament evidence a God who loves peace, not war. Ezekiel 33:11, "As surely as I live, declares the sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live." Psalms 34:14, "Turn from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it." Psalms 85:10, "Love and faithfulness meet together; righteousness and peace kiss each other." Isaiah 2:4 paints a marvelous picture of a day when "swords are beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore."

At the same time, in the Old Testament, there is a kind of realism about this messy world. Daniel 9:26 (a predictive book, most say) indicates that wars will continue until the end. Ecclesiastes says that there is "a time to kill and a time to heal; a time to tear down and a time to build up; a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to tear and a time to mend; a time to love and time to hate; a time for war and a time for peace." Say it ain't so! Well, it is so. God and His scriptures are realistic. In a sad, broken world with evil people vying for control, sometimes for good reason and other times not so good, there is war.

That's not to say that all war is justified and that peace isn't worth working toward. Peace is always the ideal. Still, there are tensions and hostilities and bitter conflicts in this fallen world. And it will always be the responsibility of those more civilized to keep the onslaught of those less civilized from inflicting terrible abuse on the masses. Where does it say that in the scripture? That's part of our challenge. Scripture isn't really a just war manual or merely a piece on the ethics of such things.

In the New Testament, everything flows out of the person and teachings of Jesus, the revelation of God's character and ultimate will for human living. The life and teachings of Christ are often paradoxical. In John 14:27 Jesus says, "My peace I give unto you," speaking of deep, internal pace and peace with God. In Matthew 10:34, Jesus says, "Don't think that I've come to bring peace. I didn't come to bring peace, but a sword." Jesus isn't talking about war or violence, but about the tensions and enmities that rise up whenever Jesus and truth are thrown into the mix. People choose sides. Even families divide. Jesus has always been a cause for people to disagree, because those who want light step up and warm our hand and those who love darkness scatter like bugs on the floor.

I Corinthians 7 says that we should live in peace. I Corinthians 14 says that God is a God of peace and order. But those scriptures are really about living at peace with one another in the Christian family. Galatians 5 says tat peace is a fruit of the Holy Spirit. Colossians 3 says, "Let the peace of Christ rule your hearts." Jesus said, "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God." James 3:18 says "Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness."

So, again, the ideal is peace. Peace with God; internal peace; peacemaking behavior - these are God's hopes for us. But again, if even someone as good and basically peaceful as Jesus creates strife, we know there will be strife. Darkness hate light. The godless hate God-lovers. Sadly, sometimes God-lovers hate the godless. Strife is real.

And, again, what would Jesus say about governance issues? Jesus says "render unto Caesars that which is Caesars and to God that which belongs to God." Jesus also encountered soldiers, during his ministry, and while he was acutely interested in their spiritual lives, he did nothing to dissuade them from their vocation. In a sense, Jesus is apolitical, mostly because issues of human politics are provincial and temporary in light of Christ's universal and everlasting agenda. I'm not saying that governance, along with war, is a trivial matter. Just that there are bigger and more lasting issues. Christ came mostly for those. All of us will die, either by hostility, accident or illness - what will happen then? Where will we spend eternity?

The New Testament really calls us to gird up and put on our armor for that spiritual war - the war for our ultimate loyalty and security. In this war, prisoners of the enemy are in great peril even in the most peaceful of times and places and soldiers of the King are safe in the most dangerous of places.

Okay, so what about our wars? What about our national governance, the defense of borders and upholding the law? 1 Peter 2:13-17, "Submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every authority instituted among men: whether to the king, as supreme authority, or to governors, who are sent by him to punish those who do wrong and to comment those who do right. For it is God's will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men. Live as free men, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God. Show proper respect for everyone; love the brotherhood of believers, fear God, honor the king."

It is a great picture of civil responsibility. Chuck Colson writes (in Kingdoms in Conflict), "Christians who are faithful to scripture should be patriots in the best sense of the word…because they love and obey the King who is above all temporal leaders. Out of that love and obedience, they live in subjection to governing authorities, love their neighbors, and promote justice. Since the state cannot legislate love, Christian citizens bring a humanizing element to civil life, helping to produce the spirit by which people do good out of compassion, not compulsion."

Does that kind of subjection mean that we never voice objection? Colson says that we must object when civil laws are in opposition to divine law. Augustine wrote "An unjust law is no law at all." Colson also says we should object when government tries to take over the role of God or church. He says we should object when the state restricts basic freedoms of conscience. And we must object when the state "flagrantly ignores mandated responsibilities to preserve life and maintain order and justice."

The Book of Acts is replete with civil disobedience - Peter, John, Paul, Silas, imprisoned for disobeying authority, but also willing to submit to the consequences.

But can we exercise civil disobedience and still love country?

C.S. Lewis likens love of country to the love of family or home. As with our families, we don't love country only when it's good. Still, as with family, we don't suspend moral judgment just because our love is loyal. Francis Schaffer asks the most obvious question about submission to controlling bodies. "Who will control the controllers?" Once, in this land, there was a moral consensus and a broad notion that we are one nation under God. Our notion of God controlled the controller. Still, we were formed as a nation of the people, by the people, for the people. Which means that, under God, the people are the collective kings, ruling through elected and appointed agents. So we must question. We must wonder and poke and prod until we're sure that government represents, more and better, the values we hold dear. In America, this is not only a privilege, but also a constituted right. And even a responsibility. We value justice. We also value dialogue and good information. It is our responsibility then to question the merit of every act of national aggression, even as it's our responsibility to support those brave people who represent our values and put their safety at risk to promote our agenda. Hopefully, the agenda justifies aggression.

To put it more simply, I would be terrified to live in a land where war and aggression can be foisted on us or on others without critical accountability. At the same time, I'd be embarrassed to live in a land that asks soldiers to defend our borders and to promote our values without honoring their bravery. And how glad I am that we have Christians sprinkled in government, the military and the peace movement, lending that humanizing element to civic life.

In my opinion, President Bush brings a refreshing blend of moral courage and healthy values to the White House. I pray for him, I voted for him and I basically think he's a decent guy, in the best of times. Still, he and others have some serious explaining to do, and they'd better find some solutions soon (God help them) or else Iraq (and even Afghanistan) are going to remind us more and more of past aggressions that began under spurious purposes and were drawn out in messy ways.

I love this country. It is not my highest love. And it's not a love without some critical elements. In words attributed to Dietrich Bonhoeffer, "We are so tired of politics. We would naturally like to give it all over to a leader in the way that a child can turn over some difficult struggle to his father. But we cannot just hand over authority to our leaders and consider that the end of our responsibility." Those concerns, of course, were a warning to those who relished the strong leadership of Adolf Hitler and were far too quick to relinquish responsibility to him. We know the consequences.

That's where we come in. Salt. Light. Ambassadors for Christ. Healers. Helpers. Teachers. Disciplers. Agents of transformation so this "spiritual recrudescence and improvement of human character" can take hold. There is no higher call. There is no bigger issue. There is no greater cause than ours, no greater real power than the transformative influence that God has implanted in our hearts and entrusted to our legions.