In March, a group of people were arrested for “plotting to levy war against the United States,” among other crimes. They were members of group described as a “Christian militia.”
I have to wonder about groups like this one. The “Hutaree,” as they call themselves, were organized in military fashion and took firearms and explosives training. Sounds like all the other militia groups except this one was girding up to do “battle with the anti-Christ”.
Their plans, according to the AP report, was to kill a police officer then bomb the funeral in an effort to jump start Armageddon. At this point they were going to personally do battle with the anti-Christ himself.
There are some flaws with this, despite their occasional use of Bible verses. A friend of mine is known for saying “what does the rest of the Bible say”, meaning that you cannot take one or two verses to build an entire doctrine. As for “the rest of the Bible” it has a lot to say about this.
The first thing that comes to my mind is the apostle Paul’s admonition that “we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” (Ephesians 6:12) I can't see a gun-toting, bomb throwing militia doing much good against these “principalities, powers and rulers in spiritual places.”
The other problem I have is that these groups, claiming to be Christian, do nothing for the Kingdom of God, however they certainly do a lot against the Kingdom. As a conservative evangelical I am often upset at the liberalism of the far left, but this shows that extremes in any direction can bring dishonor to God's name. Jesus said that we are to be peacemakers, not warmongers (Matthew 5.9). The word Christian (Χριστιανός) literally means “follower [imitator] of Christ”.
Of course, those who act and think like the Hutaree aren’t too worried about this, but the rest of us need to consider the impact of our actions and words. Too many people are bringing dishonor to our Lord; let’s not join them.
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