The trap has sprung

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and President George W. Bush

Some time ago I published an open
letter to the President of the United States warning him that he
was walking into a trap in Iraq. Most people in the Christian
community cheered the pre-emptive invasion of a sovereign nation
citing prophetic verses about the fall of Babylon.

I set an unsubscribe record for
myself when I published my letter. Before proceeding, let me lay
a few things to rest.

1. Saddam was a bad guy who
murdered his own people, murdered members of his own family,
invaded his neighbours, and no doubt would have obliterated
Israel and any other country who stood in the way of his
political ambitions.

2. Saddam needed to go.

I have been accused of being a
conservative, right-winger fanatic by liberals, a closet liberal
by conservatives, and a libertarian by both sides of the
political spectrum. The truth is far simpler: I get my politics
from the Sermon on the Mount. Either Jesus meant what he taught
or he didn’t.

A warmongering and sadly now
former friend of mine and I were discussing the immorality of
war. OK, he was cheering the Iraqi invasion while I nearly wept
at the carnage to come. I quoted to this Bible believing saint
Matthew 5: 9, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall
be called sons of God.”

His reply? “Come on, Bryan.
Be practical.” He then retorted with Edmond Burke’s
famous dictum, “All that is necessary for the triumph of
evil is for good men to do nothing.” I can conclude from
what proved to be our final civil conversation that Jesus
wasn’t practical? Either we are called to be peacemakers as
the sons of God or we are not.

This may surprise you, but I am
not against war. The scripture states, in Romans 12:18, “If
it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with
all men.” Some neighbours are harder to love than others,
Saddam being one of them. Aside from the injury and death to
civilians and soldiers on all sides of this conflict, my concerns
for the USA’s involvement in this strike much more
ominously closer to home.

Jesus gave another one of his
“impractical” statements when he warned, in Matthew 7:2,
"For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and
with the measure you use, it will be measured back to
you.”

The Christian President of the USA
made a judgment: Saddam has to go, citing his alleged (and quite
probably true) development of weapons of mass destruction, for
murder, for… well, crimes against humanity.

The USA is guilty of the blood of
our own. We have murdered some 40 million people by legalizing
abortion. Like Saddam, we also murder members of our own
families, the unborn. We are awash in a sea of innocent blood.
Saddam killed his thousands, the USA her tens of millions. Who is
guiltier before God?

The USA led the world in the
development of weapons of mass destruction. We developed much of
the technology of terror, of biological and chemical warfare.
There are still people in Vietnam walking around with Napalm
tattoos grateful they at least survived the immoral incineration
waged against them. When it comes to nuclear WMD, the USA is the
only country that has actually used it! Again, who is guiltier
before God?

While a brief cheer went up for
the stunning US led military victory, pundits were rejoicing that
there were so few American and British causalities. Now that we
are entrenched in Iraq, and the pundits who were promising a
speedy war and a quick, orderly withdraw once a new government
was in place – didn’t we do this once before, putting
Saddam into power? – are now saying we will be there in
Occupation for many, many years.

By the way, we now have
“oversight” of Iraq’s vast oil reserves.
Considering our President has a background in oil, and it was oil
money that helped him get elected, does anyone else see a
potential conflict of interest here?

Am I the only one keeping a body
count of how many American soldiers are being murdered daily in
attacks and assassinations by the people we
“liberated?” We will soon have more causalities in
peace than we did in war, and mind you, we are now in Iraq for a
generation or better. Do the math, and order the body bags. We
stepped into a trap, and the trap has sprung.

The USA set a standard of judgment
to justify toppling Saddam’s regime. Now, if the Bible is
correct, God will now use that same standard of judgment against
us. While sodomy is punishable by death in Muslim Iraq, in the
USA it is now the law of the land. Our Supreme Court has ruled
that God is wrong and the people of the USA are morally wiser
than Him. Gay marriages are not far off. Again I ask: who is
guiltier before God?

Did I also mention that it is the
Christian President of the USA who is pushing for the division of
Israel, a serious violation of God's covenant with Abraham?
Didn't Saddam have a similar objective?

We threw the gauntlet and declared
before the world that for Saddam’s crimes, his government
must fall. The false prophets in our land cheered this action on.
Now, these standards with which we have measured will now be used
to measure God’s just wrath against the USA, or was Jesus
just being “impractical” again?

To the USA, baring a genuine
revival of repentance and faith, of tearing down the wicked laws
of this land, and raising a standard of righteousness, I can only
echo the words of Jesus in Matthew 23, "Woe to you, scribes and
Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which
indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead
men’s bones and all uncleanness. Even so you also outwardly
appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and
lawlessness… Fill up, then, the measure of your
fathers’ guilt. Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you
escape the condemnation of hell?… Assuredly, I say to you,
all these things will come upon this generation… See! Your
house is left to you desolate.”

It is a truly frightening future
to contemplate that, with our military stretched to the breaking
point, we cannot adequately defend our own borders. We are
vulnerable to invasion. Will other nations conspire and weigh us
in the balance, deciding that we are guilty of creating weapons
of mass destruction, of murdering our own, and that for our
crimes against humanity, our immoral nation must fall? God help
us.

Printed with permission Bryan
Hupperts © 2003
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