Beware Of The Other

Jesus said to his disciples: "This is my commandment: love one another as I love you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father. It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give you. This I command you: love one another." (John 15:12-17)

So true! “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends.” We have many examples of this when service men and women sacrifice their lives to rescue a wounded friend – a wounded warrior.  The irony is that this “laying down of one’s life” occurs during war or armed conflicts when we break the commandment “to love one another.”

The deaths of the United States' military in Iraq and Afghanistan as of October 2021 totaled 7,054 men and women.  Well over 50,000 were wounded. During the Vietnam War 60,000 were killed.  Additionally, 150,000 were wounded with 1,600 missing.  The tallies for our “enemies” also were astounding.  The total waste of human lives makes mockery of “love one another.”

We humans as a species are capable of tremendous evil, especially evil perpetrated by our “leaders” who send soldiers off to be slaughtered and to kill.  Moreover, weapons of war are readily available and sought after by many Americans who seek them under the Second Amendment.  Bit of overkill, I will say, to own a weapon devastating to the human body and used in school shootings to maximize deaths.  

The Second Amendment to the Constitution reads: “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”  Noteworthy in 2003 the Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision (gotta love those close calls and slim majorities) concluded the Second Amendment provides an individual right to keep and bear arms for lawful purposes.  “To keep arms” the Court concluded was “a common way of referring to possessing arms, for militiamen and everyone else.”  Furthermore, the Court concluded the Second Amendment’s usage refers to all “able-bodied men” who are capable of acting in concert for the common defense.”  Interpretation of the U.S. Constitution has led to all sorts of contortions leading the nation to today’s penchant for legal possession of weapons of war and mass shootings.

“Love one another” seems to have evolved into “Beware of the other.”  Today’s secular commandment seems to be: “Defend yourself with weapons capable of maximizing death.”  Too many supposed Christians obey this commandment with Jesus’ being paid lip service.

Deacon David Pierce