Who are we planning on shooting?

There's a lot of talk going around about guns right now.  The ones who hate guns are demanding they be severely restricted and eventually outlawed entirely.  The ones who love guns are demanding that the solution is more guns, not less.  Arm the teachers, they say, and anyone fool enough to attack a school will get what's coming to him.



I'd like to stand on the middle ground.  The Constitution of the United States doesn't list any restrictions on gun ownership.  Therefore, reading it strictly, government is not authorized to limit ownership of weapons in any way.  However, the authors of the Constitution assumed that the people ruled by that document had a certain degree of sense and good will

Like the Mosaic law -- and unlike the modern legal system -- the Constitution doesn't nail down every possible permutation and eventuality.  It assumes that the people who apply its principles will be capable of thinking reasonably and coherently and with a modicum of wisdom and common sense.  In this, of course, we have proven it very, very wrong.  Still, the constitutional middle ground seem to allow law-abiding citizens to own firearms for which they have a reasonable need.

Unfortunately, there is no middle ground.  In these sort of debates, there is never a middle ground anymore.  Both sides have become banshees shrieking doom at us no matter what we choose.  So instead, I'll ask a question of my gun-loving fellow Christians.

Who are we planning on shooting?

I understand that many people want guns for hunting, so I'm not directing the question at those people.  I'm concerned with the people who want a gun to protect themselves, their families, or their property.  If you're part of that group, are you willing to actually kill someone?  Assuming you know how to use and care for a gun correctly -- and many gun owners do not -- could you actually do so against another person?

Most people would probably say that they could.  If this is true, then the question changes a bit:  should you?

I mean, as a Christian, should you kill someone, even to protect life?  The position of the vast majority of professing Christians throughout history has been to say "yes", but the fact is that that view didn't exist until several hundred years after the crucifixion.  In fact, it was only as Christianity changed and merged with the Roman Empire that violence of any kind was seen as acceptable.

The New Testament gives no indication that believers are to kill or even fight back, even to defend themselves or their families.  The Old Testament does include a great deal of material in which God not orders his people to wage war, though only in specific circumstances and always under his direct command and power.  The history of the church shows that Christians were perfectly willing to die for their faith if need be, but never willing to kill ... until the church, eager to obtain the favor of the empire, started to sell out in the fourth century.

Of course, you may say, all that is just ancient history.  We live in the now.  Well, so does God.  In fact, he's eternal, and thus outside time, so he's a lot nower than you'll ever be.  And he's the one who inspired the authors of Scripture.  Do you think he just didn't see this coming?  Do you think that because he spoke all those centuries ago, his words don't apply here and now?  Do you think he can't be trusted?

I'm not condemning or attacking anyone who believes differently.  I'm just asking those who do think otherwise to examine why they believe these things.  Most evangelical Christians would claim to base their beliefs on Scripture.  If that's the way you feel, then I encourage you to search Scripture and be sure that it really is your foundation.  In the course of a few months in 2004, I went from a proud veteran of the US Navy to an outspoken pacifist, based on what I saw in the Bible.  I haven't seen anything since to change my mind.

Just be willing to look, and be willing to believe what you see.  God's grace and mercy upon us all.