Inter-Varsity Press

Contents

Part 1: Setting the scene
1. Introduction: Living As Christians through the War on Terror
2. What is terrorism and the War on Terror?

Part 2: War and peace
3. ‘Love your enemies’ – even after September 11?
Matthew 5:9, 38–48
4. Why does God allow war and terrorism?
Jeremiah 4:11–27

Part 3: Citizens of heaven
5. Living with two passports
Philippians 3:12–21; Jeremiah 29:1–33
6. A tale of two cities: nationalism, terrorism and reconciliation
Acts 10:1–23
7. Learning to be peacemakers – in the church and in the world
Philippians 4:2–9
8. The Battle Of Jericho and the London bombs
Joshua 5:13 – 6:27
9. After Beslan: ‘The cords of death entangled me’
Psalm 116

Part 4: Christian hope and the War on Terror
10. Who is winning the War on Terror?
Jeremiah 32 – 33
11. Christian hope and suicide bombers
Acts 28:17–31
12. Conclusion: The church and the War on Terror

Digging deeper: Three study guides
Study guide 1: Exploring terrorism and the War on Terror
Study guide 2: Christian stances on war
Study guide 3: Christian positions on the War on Terror

Taking this further

Introduction: Living as Christians through the War on Terror

In March 2003, on the eve of the US invasion of Iraq, a group of Iraqi church workers wrote a harrowing open letter to fellow Christians in America. ‘Every day we thank God for being alive because we do not know what tomorrow has hidden for us,’ they said. ‘The nightmare of the new war is haunting us always and everywhere,’ they continued, imploring their American brothers and sisters in Christ not to compound their suffering by launching another attack on their homeland.

If the Iraqi Christians expected that Western believers would unite to support them, they were tragically mistaken. Although the war’s most prominent critics included the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Pope and evangelical leaders from around the world, its major architects, US President George W. Bush and UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, were also well known for their Christian faith. Whilst the US National Council of Churches led prayers for peace, other churches organized prayer campaigns in support of the war, and one American prayer network called for ‘cruise and scud prayers’ against Iraq to speed the US victory. Although these sharp divisions arguably damaged the reputation of Christianity, the real cost to the church was in the large numbers of Christians, mainly American and Iraqi, who died in Iraq itself – sometimes killed by fellow believers belonging to the ‘other side’. Their plight, and indeed the plight of all Iraqis, has turned this desperate letter on the eve of the war into a question that haunts the Western Christian church – how should we have replied to them?

President Bush himself was clear: he justified the invasion of Iraq by linking it to the attacks on New York and Washington on 11 September 2001 and the danger of further attacks if Iraq acquired ‘weapons of mass destruction’. Since then, Christians have been forced to confront the question of how we are to respond to the War on Terror, a question made more complicated by the open divisions in the church on the issue. Subsequent incidents directly or indirectly related to that fateful Tuesday have reinforced the urgency of this: from the US-led invasions of Afghanistan in 2002 and Iraq in 2003, to Islamist suicide bomb attacks against public transport in Madrid on 11 March 2004, and London on 7 July 2005. (Unsuccessful plots, such as the alleged Islamist attempt to blow up airliners taking off from Britain that was foiled in August 2006, have further underlined how pressing this topic is.)

These events inevitably raise many questions for us. Where was God on 9/11, 7/7, and when the bombs started falling on Afghanistan and Iraq? Why does God allow wars and terrorist attacks to happen? Should Western Christians support or oppose their government’s wars? Should Palestinian and Iraqi Christians support armed resistance to the occupation of their lands?

What relevance is the gospel to the big international political questions of our day? Is there a distinctive message that the church can proclaim at this time? How can the Bible guide our thinking and help us live out our daily lives in the War on Terror? Do the Old and New Testaments contradict each other in what they teach about how we should treat our enemies? Was Jesus seriously commanding us to ‘love our enemies’, even when they are suicide bombers or enemy soldiers? What can ordinary Christians do, and how should we pray for the world?

Answering difficult questions

The questions posed by the War on Terror are vitally important. Because they have made such an impact on public consciousness and daily life, no Christian can avoid them, and this book is intended to provide readers with biblical insights to enable them to begin to answer these questions for themselves. It is written from the conviction that the questions raised by the War on Terror are amongst the most important of our age, but that their consideration should be rooted in a life of Christian worship that is fed by reflection on Scripture.

The Bible and the world

Chapters 3–10 of this book are expositions of Scripture, rooted in the evangelical tradition. This author affirms that the Bible is the revealed Word of God that exists primarily to point humankind to salvation by faith in the gospel of Christ and to holy lives worthy of that calling. The book considers the War on Terror in relation to this. It is hoped that the reader will be equipped not merely to think about war, but also spiritually built up in their faith in Christ, and better enabled to witness to the gospel by talking sensibly to non-Christians in the context of discussions about war.

The author is not an academic theologian by training, but a political geographer, which is reflected in this book. I have spent much of the past decade conducting research on nationalism, violence and peace in the Islamic world. More recently, I have worked on the politics of the War on Terror and church responses to it. During this time I have travelled widely in Muslim countries. My study of practical problems in these fraught contexts has led me to an increasingly strong conviction that the Bible is the most practical book ever written, and that a violent and warring world is simply crying out for real Christianity. At the same time, my involvement with Christian minorities in Muslim countries has sensitized me to their concerns and plight. Whenever we talk about how ‘we’ as Christians should respond to the War on Terror, we ought to recall that that ‘we’ includes Palestinians, Iraqis and others as well as Britons and Americans. A key theme in this book is that the church, created by God of all those saved in Christ Jesus, is our primary community of belonging, our primary citizenship.

This book began life as a number of sermons preached in Cambridge, UK. As part of the normal cycle of church worship, they were intended to assist people to encounter God by proclaiming his salvation. However, they tended to occur at times such as the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, the invasion of Iraq, and the London bombs, and my set texts were also peculiarly appropriate to the subject of the War on Terror. Because of this, I had to address questions that my congregations faced, the questions listed above. Their positive responses and the encouragement of other Christians who read the texts persuaded me to write this book.

What does the Bible say about war?

One of the twentieth century’s greatest British evangelical preachers, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, taught during the German Blitz on London in World War 2 that war is a manifestation (an example, a symptom) and a consequence of sin, for which humanity as a race must bear responsibility. However, God has not left us by ourselves to sort out this mess. By Christ’s death and resurrection, every man, woman and child, through repentance and faith in Christ, may know forgiveness of sins, peace with God and the transforming power of his Holy Spirit in their lives. But that must not stop at a mere inner change. What Paul calls ‘the gospel of peace’ – the creation in Christ of a new nation of people made up from every human nation – has relevance to every aspect of human life, including war and terrorism in the twenty-first century.

Outline

The key conviction of this book is, therefore, that the Christian gospel, as revealed in the Bible and testified to by the church, is God’s glorious answer to the violence that sinful humanity has wreaked upon the world.

Although each chapter can be read individually as an exposition of Scripture, the book is divided into three parts that develop an overall argument. This first part sets the book in the context of recent events and Christian responses to them.

The second part, ‘War and peace’, addresses the ‘big questions’ – why war happens, what our response should be, and how this is all grounded in the great biblical doctrines of salvation by grace. Having established this, the chapters in the third part, ‘Citizens of heaven’, explore some practical aspects of this at greater length. These include being citizens of heaven and also citizens of warring states, how to learn the skills of peacemaking, and how ordinary Christians have transformed violent situations by obedient faith in Christ. Chapters 7 and 8 look at war in the New and Old Testaments, and how being citizens of heaven changed with the first coming of Christ. All of these chapters, to some degree or another, indicate that the gospel brings hope to a violent world. The final part, ‘Christian hope and the War on Terror’, brings out the theme of hope more explicitly. It is recommended that the relevant biblical passage be read prayerfully before starting each chapter.

In addition there are three study guides. They are accessible introductions to the general reader and assume no expertise in these fields, but they should also help to clarify and summarize arguments for people with more knowledge. Recommended reading, questions and suggestions are provided to help with both individual and church group study. Finally, a short list of ideas is included for churches to take this further.

Gospel witness in wartime

As war clouds gathered over Europe in 1939, Anglican Bishop George Bell wrote a remarkable essay asking what the church’s function in wartime was. He argued simply that, ‘it is the function of the Church at all costs to remain the Church’ and ‘preach the gospel of Christ’. There is no separate gospel for wartime and peacetime, he explained, and the church must not take one side or the other when conflict begins. In emotionally charged climates of hatred, fear, retaliation and nationalist fervour, that may not be an easy position to adhere to. Bishop Bell admitted this himself: ‘The Church may have a difficult task in wartime. But it has an extraordinary opportunity.’ The War on Terror is just such an opportunity for Christians confidently and intelligently to proclaim their gospel to the world, whether that is in national debates, over tea-break discussions with work colleagues, over dinner with friends, during university seminars, or in the school playground. It is my hope and prayer that this book will enable Christians to do just that.