Between the Lines XII: The essential war
“There’s so much anger…and it’s coming out everywhere.” Ben Mezrich, author of Breaking Twitter.
On one level, war is about weapons and destruction and death. We see it in the news every day. But a more useful definition of war, one that can actually help to end war, is to see war as a struggle to overcome destructive mental qualities. Until we approach it as such, and attack and destroy mental evil as the primary enemy, we will never get control of war.
David Darke in Holy War is constantly at war with himself. He fights against the alarm of fear, the pull of temptation, the passion of hatred, against anything that will distract him from what he believes is his mission, to perform prophetic journalism – journalism that changes the news. To do this, he habitually turns to angels to manage his thinking. Angels, he is convinced, are messages of love from God, and they bring intelligent action and healing. He has experienced that healing in his body, and he has brought it to others. And he also has come to rely on angels in producing his prophetic journalism.
The newspaper column David writes is called “Be Not Afraid.” As he tells Tamar early in their relationship:
I gather facts like a journalist, because you have to have the facts, but you get the truth from angels. Angels are on a different level. I’m convinced they can actually change the news. I don’t want to just report what’s going on. I want to do something about it, if something’s not right. I want to help people learn that they can expect good to happen, not just hope for good but expect it, and that this expectation is an actual force for change. After the earthquake, wind and fire of the world, I want to help people hear the still, small voice [of truth and love] and then act on it.
A frequent theme of mine in these Wednesday commentaries is how important the thinking of each one of us is. How we think is a key factor not only in what we do but also in how the world behaves. A single victory over fear in ourselves, for example, makes victory over fear that much more likely for others in the world. It can change their news and, in turn, change the news for people beyond them.
So, don’t think that just because you’re thousands of miles from Ukraine or Palestine, or far from the political wars in the United States, you have no influence on those situations. Your thought and mine are an active part of what is happening in the world, and to the extent that we overcome greed, selfishness, fear, hatred, dishonesty, false pride, self-righteousness, complacency, confusion, fatalism in ourselves, we become part of the solution to those wars. In the mental world is where the real action lies. Humanity will not find peace until we all have fought these wars to their conclusions in ourselves.
Fighting wars mentally is not being passive, as anyone who has struggled with nasty habits in themselves can attest. To the degree that you and I harbor the mental evils that we see in war, we are contributing to those wars, and to the degree that we conquer them, we are contributing to peace.
So, it’s one big holy war we are engaged in. But this fact – that real war is mental, holy war – makes it important to be alert to people and movements that use religion for nefarious reasons. In Holy War, American rabble rouser Jonah Meek and Russian President Ilya Chestnov are using religion to justify their destructive ambitions. In real life today, there are obviously many places where religion is being used to justify and even further warlike aims. A good overview of the situation in this regard in the United States, for example, can be found in two recent episodes of the excellent podcast Politicology (access here and here). Host Ron Steslow interviews Matthew Taylor, writer and creator of the audio-documentary series “Charismatic Revival Fury: The New Apostolic Reformation," and they discuss, without judgment, how some people glorify a violent kind of “spiritual” warfare, including the violence that happened at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Real spiritual warfare is never violent. As the Bible puts it in II Corinthians (10:3-5), “…though we walk after the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds), casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.”
This means, as David is learning, that the spiritual war he and Tamar are engaged in is not against Meek or Chestnov but against hypocrisy, lust, hate, fear, arrogance – whatever would block angels from reaching humanity. He is gradually understanding what it means that love conquers evil. Of course, understanding is only the beginning. He also has to prove it, again and again. But proof follows understanding as day follows dawn.
Hold to truth, love, patience, honesty, purity. What you know and do will help save you and others. Keep moving forward, investing your spiritual talents, and eventually humanity “shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore” (Isaiah 2:4).
Finally, I encourage you to read a letter written by author Kurt Vonnegut in 1967 to support his son’s application for conscientious objector status during the Vietnam War. It’s a simple and powerful statement of conviction against war. As the final line says, “There’s no hope in war.”
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