From a Bad Movie

I'm sure you've seen the scene repeated over and over in different movies. The bad guy has someone important in their power -- a loved one, a president, an innocent victim, whatever -- with the threat of deadly violence to them if the good guy doesn't drop his own carefully aimed, tightly held weapon. And how many times have we yelled at the screen, "Don't do it!"? Why? Because disarming yourself in the face of evil is stupid.

But, that's Hollywood. That's writers. I mean, it's fiction. Except it's not. Not when it comes to Christians in today's world.

These days they will be threatening something precious -- marriage, religious freedom, biblical truth, clear morality -- and tell us to put down our weapons. Put down your prayers. Put down your Scripture. Drop your religion. Throw aside your "flying spaghetti monster". And Someone is screaming, "Don't do it!" And a lot of us do it anyway.

"Well," the "wise" of this world will tell you, "you can't expect an unbeliever to accept your arguments based on Scripture when they deny Scripture." Except that Scripture says, "The word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart" (Heb 4:12) and "All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work" (2 Tim 3:16-17) and "It is written, "'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'" (Matt 4:4) and "Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ." (Rom 10:17).

"Don't pray!" the skeptic scorns. "Do!" Except that the Word of God says, "Pray without ceasing" (1 Thess 5:17), "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God" (Phil 4:6), and "The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working." (James 5:16).

"Where is your God now?" they taunt. "You're going to have to deal with us on our terms." Except the Word says that God is "the only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords" (1 Tim 6:15) and assures us "If God is for us, who can be against us?" (Rom 8:31).

Look, it makes perfect sense in the minds of writers of fiction that the good guy should set aside the only thing that is keeping the evil one from harming others and killing our protagonist. Perfect sense. Except it's nonsense. And when we agree to it in this spiritual warfare in which we're engaged, we're fools. And when the father of lies says, "If you drop your weapons no one will get hurt," please know that he's lying. As for me, I intend to keep my arsenal.