Insurrection, Terrorism, and Revolts

An Anabaptist's thoughts about Independence Day

In my lifetime Iraq has made the headlines on many occasions beginning in the 80's with the Iraq-Iran wars and particularly Sir Oliver North's Iran-Contra weapons deal. Later I read about the 1st Gulf War and the 2nd Gulf War and now again today they are making headlines as a group makes their way through the country turning it upside down, again. Horrifying? Yes!

But this never happens in the United States...right? Unfortunately it did, twice (Revolutionary War and Civil War). There are two things we learn from history, one is that we do not learn from history and two, history repeats itself. What bothers me in particular is that no one is living today that vividly remembers the events of the Revolution or of the Civil War. This is significant because when the generations are gone that lived through an event, the subsequent generations "forget" what was important and how to prevent such catastrophes in the future. (See the Old Testament book of Judges for a multi-century example.)

So, when you think of a revolution do you think of it as a good thing or a bad thing? I guess that would really depend on what the conditions are before the revolution and how they end up after the revolution. I would like to consider the American Revolution for a bit. Most of the history textbooks I studied in school taught that the American Revolution was necessary, inevitable, and a "good" thing...well at least that's what I understood.

I recently finished the book, "In God We Don't Trust" by David W Bercot. In this book Mr. Bercot points out a number areas that the people of United States did not choose to trust God. I think this is a great book that points out some incorrect popular thinking. I don't really want to summarize the book here, you should read it for yourself. In reading the book I had to think seriously about the events in the 1770's in the colonies.

You see, any time you have a war there are always at least 2 sides to the story and the American Revolution is no exception. What if you were just fine and comfortable living in subjection to the King of England? What if you had pledged allegiance to the King and you did not want to go back on your word? What if you believed that the Bible taught you should obey the government and pay your taxes? (Read Romans 13) What would you do? By the way, at the point of the Revolution the colonists were the least taxed subjects in the British Empire (according to David Bercot).

Well, we can look at what some people did. Some people were committed to be loyal to England and went to the British for protection and fought with the British. Then there were those who had moved to the New World in search of freedom to practice their religion, some of these were Amish, Mennonites, and Quakers. These deeply religious groups opposed taking up arms for anything more than shooting a deer or a rabbit and it was the furthest thing from their mind to fight in a war where you would actually kill people.

Needless to say, these people were at seriously philosophical odds with the revolting colonists. So what did the rebels do? They all agreed that everyone should have the inalienable right to worship and believe as they see fit...right? Not a chance! Instead the revolutionaries required everyone to take an oath of allegiance to the new government and oppose the rule of England. If someone refused to take this oath they had their property confiscated, were fined, imprisoned, and in some cases hanged. For more reading check out this link: http://www.anabaptists.org/history/anabaptists-during-revolutionary-war.html

So what do I make of this?

Please don't assume that I am anti-American! I am as much an American as anyone born in the United States. I do believe, however, that it is important to place the teachings of the Bible over and above anything and everything. How do we perceive someone in a country without religious freedom who puts their faith in Jesus? As a hero? Would they be classified as anti-(Chinese, North Korean, Indonesian, Iranian...)? To some governments, YES! In fact property confiscation, hangings, and executions are common is many countries around the world. These people are not anti-"their country" rather they have pledged allegiance to another kingdom, the Kingdom of God. They are willing to serve the true King no matter what. These people don't value their guns, rights, or possessions. They see the world around them as divided into 2 camps, those as part of the Kingdom of God and those who are not. Instead of warring between the kingdoms we instead want to win the other camp, not kill or destroy but persuade them to switch sides.

This July 4th the phrase, "bombs bursting in the air..." will have a new meaning, one that troubles me. Currently "Caesar" resides in Washington DC and the IRS gobbles up my paycheck but at one time "Caesar" resided in London. When those wars were being fought, how would I have responded? How will I respond? What's more important? Our rights? Or God's Word?