Fighting evil with evil

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O Beloved One

What has happened to us?

 

We read the news and we are bewildered

Angered

Saddened

Frightened

 

It is not that there is evil in the world

There has always been evil in the world

 

It is that those forces that should be resisting evil

are instead aligning with evil

 

Those with power

Politicians

Religious leaders

 

The righteous and the upright

have chosen NOT the way of justice

humility

servanthood

compassion and love

 

but the way of domination

the way of oppression and suppression

retribution and coercion

control and punishment

 

Instead of fighting for children, they fight for guns

Instead of fighting for true freedom, they fight for the ability to make others

Subservient and controlled

 

Instead of insisting on truth, they embrace falsehood  

Instead of forgiving they seek to “own” the other side

Instead of giving, they seek to accumulate

Instead of supporting the vulnerable, they abandon them

Instead of offering grace, they demand merit (you better work for SNAP)

Instead of valuing all lives, they seek to extinguish those they do not deem as valuable

And deny the right of LGBTQI+ people to exist (as if God made a mistake)

 

While piously holding their Bibles aloof

And posturing with prayer

While insisting they are pro-life

And the protectors of children

They ignore what Jesus teaches and fail

To “do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with God?”

Micah 6:8

 

While insisting that they are going to create a theocracy

They create a worldly empire that violates God

In every way conceivable.

 

We are called to overcome evil with good

With truth

Kindness

Generosity

Forgiveness

 

Instead, all too often, when seeking to overcome evil

We use evil

And thus do not overcome evil but strengthen it

Perpetuating it

 

And evil in “holy” clothing

Is the most powerful evil of all

 

Jesus knew this, which is why his harshest words

His biggest challenges were directed toward

Those aligned with empire

With the political and religious power structure

 

Does it have to be this way?  Is this the way it will always be?

 

O beloved, we all fall short of the glory of God

Only Jesus ever lived out the divine potential

We are loved anyway

 

I personally have more than my fair share of issues

And can cry with Paul

“I do not understand my own actions.

 For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.”

 

But I do believe this

Even though we stumble and struggle

And sometimes fail

 

We can choose the path of Jesus

Instead of the path of domination

 

We can partner not with Empire and the forces of the world

But with the Spirit,

 

And

 

We can “ do nothing from selfish ambition or empty conceit, but in humility regard others as better than ourselves”

We can choose “not look to our own interests but to the interests of others”

 

We can seek the mind of Christ

 

who, though he existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God

as something to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave,

assuming human likeness. and being found in appearance as a human, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death — even death on a cross (Phil. 2)

 

Beloved On

Be among us

Be in us

 

We need your help, now!