Voices in My Head Podcast Episode #220: "Fire and Fury" or "Grace and Mercy"?

Today's podcast is brought to you by Audible. Get a free audiobook download and 30-day free trial at audibletrial.com/voicesinmyhead. That's audibletrial.com/voicesinmyhead. Over 180,000 titles to choose from for your iPhone, Android, Kindle, or MP3 player. That's audibletrial.com/voicesinmyhead. Give it a try today. Welcome to Voices in My Head, the official podcast of me, Rick Lee James. I'm a recording artist, a singer-songwriter, an author, a worship leader, and an ordained minister in the Church of the Nazarene. The Voices in My Head podcast is your source for discussions on music, literature, movies, pop culture, theology, and more. Now sit back, relax, and listen to the latest episode of The Voices Voices in My Head podcast. And don't forget to let the voices in your head be heard by following me on Twitter @RickLeeJames and sharing your thoughts about today's show. Welcome back to Voices in My Head. As always, I am your host, Rick Lee James. I'm so glad that you could be here again today for this next episode of Voices in My Head. I really hope you enjoyed last week and my conversation with Britt Bullerjack. That was so much fun.— and just a reminder that that was a crossover podcast, and that episode can also be heard on her podcast, This Nazarene Life. I really strongly encourage you to check that podcast out, especially if you are part of the Church of the Nazarene. It is just great to be able to hear from some of our ministers, young and old, big churches, small churches, and everywhere in between. Well, today we are going to move into sort of a current events episode. —something I wanted to talk about for a while, but events kind of happened and pressed us into this time. So I am going to talk about fire and fury today, and it is going to be a topic based off of a recent statement made by President Trump. Just before I get into that, I want to remind you that there is some big news coming your way in September, and I cannot tell you what it is just yet. But those who listen to the podcast, I have already said that I am going to tell you first, even if it is just like a a day before. So keep listening about mid-September for some big news. There is going to be a big release in CCM Magazine, and I am really excited to be able to share that with you when the time comes. And just until then, I want to just remind you to wait, and it is coming, I promise. I don't know exactly when I am going to make the response, so keep listening to the podcast, or when I am going to make this announcement, but I am excited to be able to share it with you. I also want to remind you that on August 16th, which is a Wednesday, that is going to be the day that my new music video, "More Than the Watchmen Psalm 130," releases. It is going to be on YouTube. It will be on Facebook and other places online. I encourage you to watch it and share it, not just because it is one of my songs, which that is always an honor when you do that, but I really hope that we can share this because we are trying in this video to raise awareness for the plight of refugees around the world, especially Syrian refugees. There are going to be some unique things in this video, some video footage you haven't seen before, I can guarantee it. Thanks to our friends at Nazarene Compassionate Ministries who have allowed me to use some video they shot last year in some of the refugee camps and in the train stations where these people are, are displaced due to violence and persecution. In their home countries. And so I am really hoping that this video is a way to bring help, to bring, if nothing else, a way to put faces to people that we can pray for. And so I am really hoping and asking for your help to share it and share it often whenever the video comes out next week. You can go to YouTube.com/RickLeeJames. You can go to Facebook.com/RickLeeJames. It will be on Twitter @RickLeeJames. It will be at my website RickLeeJames.com. There will be many ways for you to find it. I just ask you to please watch it and share it with as many people as you can. I would love to create a new audience for this that does not have anything to do necessarily with even the podcast or even my music specifically. I just want to get the word out as much as we can, and we pray that there will be a lot of help come from this. I feel like God has been helping along every step along the way, even with giving us this idea. Providing the resources for it, from video footage to amazing creative people to work with who do such incredible videography work, and talented photographers and musicians that I have got to work with along the way. We pray it will be used for His glory. Well, with that being said, I am going to get into the topic of today. It is just me today, no guest. But on August 8th, 2017, during his stay at Bedminster, New Jersey Golf Club, his golf club, President Trump said this in response to threats made on the United States by North Korea. Let's listen to what he said. North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States. They will be met with fire and fury. Like the world has never seen. He has been very threatening beyond a normal statement. And as I said, they will be met with fire, fury, and frankly, power, the likes of which this world has never seen before. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So fire, fury, and power, the likes of which this world has never seen before. I guess he doesn't believe in God. Anyway, I would like to go from there and say, you know, people reacted immediately to the president's word. They reacted with people like William J. Perry, the United States of America's 19th Secretary of Defense. He said this, he said, nuclear deterrence is only effective if threats are deemed credible. Bluster hurts our national security posture. Rex Tillerson, the current Secretary of State, said the president felt the need to issue a very strong statement to North Korea about the US capability to defend itself and its allies. However, he insisted there was no drastic change in rhetoric for— in the last 24 hours, and that Americans should sleep well at night. Well, then North Korea responded back, saying Pyongyang is ready to teach the US a severe lesson with its nuclear strategic force. Well, it's very interesting to see the responses that come out from Secretaries of State from North Korea itself, the president's initial response. It's interesting what powers of the world believe that true power is, what they believe true strength is. As I said, I was semi-joking when I said, "I guess he doesn't believe in God," but I'm kind of thinking about all these people who put so much trust in the nation and in the empire. I think, well, certainly the church should have a voice in that, right, and be able to say something about the use of violence. And then we have this guy, Texas megachurch pastor Robert Jeffress, one of President Trump's evangelical advisors. And he released a statement saying that the president has the moral authority to take out North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. And here's some quotes from this pastor: When it comes to how we should deal with evildoers, the Bible in the book of Romans is very clear. God has endowed rulers full power to use whatever means necessary, including war, to stop evil. In the case of North Korea, God has given Trump authority to take out Kim Jong-un. And he also said in a phone interview, this pastor said that he was prompted to make the statement after Trump said that if North Korea's threats to the United States continue, Pyongyang will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen. Jeffress is also quoted as saying the biblical passage Romans 13 gives the government authority to deal with evildoers. That gives the government the authority to do whatever, whether it's assassination, capital punishment, or evil punishment to quell the actions of evildoers like Kim Jong-un. He then said many Christian pacifists will cite Romans 12, which says do not repay evil for evil, but that passage is referring to Christians and not to the government. And he says that a Christian writer once asked him, "Don't you want the president to embody the Sermon on the Mount?" And Pastor Jeffress' response was, "Absolutely not." Now, the Romans 13 passage— this is me, not anymore quoting at this point— the Romans 13 passage, it always creates a problem for Christians, doesn't it? Because it could be interpreted that Kim Jong-un also has authority to govern according to Romans 13. Which is also the case for, you know, we could say that of the US. I guess it has the authority, and so does North Korea, and so did Nazi Germany, and so does Russia, and so do all these other places. So which one really has the godly authority, you know? So who shall we consult about what the Bible says on this matter? Because it seems we have multiple viewpoints on the issue from people who use the same Bible And they claim to worship the same God. And yet everybody seems to interpret that in a different way. God's always on our side, no matter what side we're on, it seems. And some people, you know, specifically evangelicals, so I'll pick on us a little bit, might say that the Bible is self-explanatory and needs no interpretation. Well, this creates a problem though, doesn't it? Because the evangelical movement itself does not support that statement. They might say they do, but they don't. I mean, there's dozens of conflicting interpretations about the Bible. There's different evangelicals that have different views on many different topics. Just go to a group of evangelical pastors from different denominations and bring up the topic of the rapture, or creationism, or the flood, or multiple things throughout Scripture. You're going to have lots of different viewpoints. And everybody's gonna say they're right, and everybody's gonna say God's on their side in every situation. Everyone interprets Scripture differently, it seems. And the interesting thing is that everybody interprets Scripture from the moment they first hear it, or from the moment they first read it for themselves, they're interpreting Scripture in some ways. When we hear Scripture, we're interpreting it with information that we have around us. If we have bad information, we're going to interpret it badly. Now sometimes the Holy Spirit does reveal things to us, and I think that happens a lot when we come to Scripture, and I don't want to discredit that or discount that in any way. I believe that's how we come to know truth, is by the Holy Spirit's leading. But almost all of the conflicting viewpoints on Scripture that are held by evangelicals, these evangelicals claim that these things they are disagreeing on are all revealed by the Holy Spirit. So if we believe that truth isn't relative and there's only one truth, then where should we side on this? Where should we come down with matters like this? Should we say like Pastor Jeffress that it's okay for us to do evil in the name of God because these other people are doing evil and they need to be responded to with evil? Should we say that no, we don't We don't want people to respond like Jesus. We want them to ignore the Sermon on the Mount because that's what we really should do. Well, I'm personally gonna side with our Catholic family on this and our Orthodox family. And let me tell you why, and I'll tell you what I'm siding with them on. They think it's better that Scripture be interpreted by the authority which Jesus gave the authority to. You can see this in Matthew 16:18-19 when Jesus says, "And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven." So, you know, to an extent I agree with Catholics on this. They feel that the early church fathers going back to the disciples, Peter and the disciples, that they were the Christians who were the most plugged into the teachings of Jesus because they were with Jesus. Now we could argue from reading scripture that it didn't seem like they were very plugged in at times, but they were, you know, in a sense, more disciples than we are. They knew what the apostles were saying about the faith. And so let me explain what I mean by this, that they were more disciples than we are, that they were more apostol than we are. I've heard an illustration before about marriage. And I'm not saying that we are not disciples or that our faith journey has, you know, that it should be looked at as less than the apostles. But what I'm saying is this, and I'm gonna use this, what I believe it was Scott Daniels that said at one time, made it sound really good, better than I'm gonna do right now, I'm sure. He talked about marriage. He said, "You know, on the day I was married, I was married. You know, it happened. We were married. And we were married a very short time, but from the time the preacher said 'I do,' we kissed, we put on the rings, all those things in that ceremony, we were married." But he said, "But you know what? After 20, 25 years of marriage, I'm much more married than I was when I was first married." I'm really married now. We've been through some things. We know more what marriage is. We're discovering more what marriage is because we've been in it longer. We know what it means to deal with kids in a different way than we did. We didn't understand it when we were first married. We weren't quite as married as we were, and yet we were just as married then. But now, all these years later, we're really married. It's kind of like that with the disciples, I think. It's not that we're any less disciples, but it's that these disciples were with Jesus, and they are like really disciples. We have some mileage to go. You know, we've been journeying for a certain amount of time with our Lord, but they really journeyed with him. They're still journeying with him because we believe that they are still with the Lord in all this time. So when it comes to interpreting the words of Jesus. You know, these were actually the words of Jesus to us before we had the written words of Jesus. These teachings of the early church fathers and the disciples, they were the ones that actually gave us our scripture. They were the ones that taught us before we had the word. They are the reason we have the word. They are the reason we have the creeds. So the church fathers, just by this standard, is they helped bring the church into the world. So I think it's very useful to study what the church fathers taught and wrote about the interpretation of Scripture. Otherwise, we will come to Romans 13 and we'll say things like this Pastor Jeffress said that are, I think, completely off base and not at all like Jesus. So it's important that we pay attention to the traditions of our church as much as just the words, and as much as even more than just what we're feeling off the top of our chest based on our political values. So, for our purposes here, and as I talk about the church fathers a little bit today, who are the church fathers? I mean, everybody quotes the church fathers. I've done it myself, and usually we just say, "Oh, the church fathers said this," and then we'll name some, you know, we'll quote something out of context, and we'll say some name that we've never actually read for ourselves. So, I'm going to explain a little bit what I mean when I say church fathers. The church fathers are the apostolic fathers. These are people who lived before 200 AD. They were the people that we call the patristics. They really stretch from around 200 AD to around 749 AD. They were directly influenced and taught by the disciples, by the apostles, by the original 11 apostles, not the 12 because Judas, you know. But they are included, they include, and they are not limited to, though. These are just a few of the names. We have Clement, the Bishop of Rome. We have Ignatius. We have Polycarp. We have Justin Martyr. We have Saint Irenaeus. We have Cyprian and more. So, the early church fathers lived between 200 and 800 AD. Let us just say that for our purposes today. These early church fathers, again, they are known as the patristics. The patristics. Yeah, I think I said that right. I trip over my words a lot, so I apologize. So, we are just going to say for our purposes today the patristic period closes with the death of John of Damascus around 749. So, With that in mind, I am especially interested in what the church fathers have to say on the issue of war and peace. Since these are the authorities of the church who were directly taught by the disciples, and the disciples were taught by Jesus, and these are the people who gave us the scripture, and they gave us the creeds, and they gave us really the church, um, I think we should give credence to how they tell us to interpret the word of God. On matters, especially of things so important like these that have to do with war and peace and how we go, where we go from there. And I should let you know that I'm taking a lot of these quotes. There is a blog that was written by a lady named Darlene N. Bocek. It's B-O-C-E-K. And she has compiled many of these quotes in one place, which is wonderful. Because I have got all the books on my shelf, and I have got a lot I can go to on my Kindle and pull them out, but it is so much easier to be able to reference in one place. Darlene, she lives in the land of old Byzantium in Izmir, Turkey, and she is a pastor's wife, and she is a former public school teacher. She is a homeschool teacher, and she writes on history and Christian thought and homeschooling, and she has just done a wonderful service for us by compiling this on her blog. Many of these quotes. So I wanted to give credit to her. If you haven't gone to her blog, it's really good. Darleneinbocek.com. That's D-A-R-L-E-N-E-B-O-C-E-K dot com. So I wanted you to, to be able to look there, but she's compiled a lot. So the question I guess I have is, we hear these words today, we have scripture, but now I want to hear from the people who gave us Scripture, and from the people that God led to write Scripture and bring it forth for us, and to be able to canonize it, and the people who gave us the creeds of the church and the things that we believe. I want to give time to them to speak to us what they believe the Word is saying. So the question is, the fire and fury and the power of the Empire, or the grace and mercy and power of Jesus? So let's look at some quotes today from the early church fathers. "I serve Jesus Christ, the eternal King. I will no longer serve your emperors. It is not right for a Christian to serve the armies of this world." That was Marcellus the Centurion, 298 AD, spoken as he gave up his post in the army of the Emperor Diocletian because of his Christian faith. Here's another one: We ourselves were well conversant with war, murder, and everything evil, but all of us throughout the whole wide earth have traded in our weapons of war. We have exchanged our swords for plowshares, our spears for farm tools. Now we cultivate the fear of God, justice, kindness, faith, and the expectation of the future given us through the crucified one. "The more we are persecuted and martyred, the more do others in ever-increasing number become believers." And that was Justin Martyr, 100 AD to 165 AD. Here's another one: "Murder is considered a crime when people commit it singly, is transformed into a virtue when they do it en masse." That was Saint Cyprian, 200 AD to 258 AD. "We who formerly hated and murdered one another now live together and share the same table. We pray for our enemies and try to win those who hate us." Justin Martyr, 100 AD to 165 AD. "It is absolutely forbidden to repay evil with evil." That was Tertullian, 160 AD to 220 AD. Interesting in light of the comments from this pastor that we had that said we should repay evil with evil. Here's another one: To those who ask us whence we have come or whom we have for a leader, we say that we have come in accordance with the counsels of Jesus to cut down our warlike and arrogant swords of argument into plowshares, and we convert into sickles the spears we formerly used in fighting. For we no longer take sword against a nation, nor do we learn any more to make war. Having become sons of peace for the sake of Jesus who is our leader, instead of following the ancestral customs in which we were strangers to the covenant. That was Origen, 185-254 AD. Hitherto I have served you as a soldier. Allow me now to become a soldier to God. Let the man who is to serve you receive your donative. I am a soldier of Christ. It is not permissible for me to fight. Martin of Tours, 315-397 AD. Christians, instead of arming themselves with swords, extend their hands in prayer. Athanasius of Alexandria, 293-373 AD. The Christian poor are an army without weapons, without war, without bloodshed, without anger, without defilement. Clement of Alexandria, 150-214 AD. I do not wish to be a ruler. I do not strive for wealth. I refuse offices connected with military command. Tatian of Assyria, died around 185 AD. Above all, Christians are not allowed to correct by violence sinful wrongdoings. Clement of Alexandria, 150 AD to 214 AD. Here's a good one. The Christian does not hurt even his enemy. Tertullian, 160 AD to 220 AD. None of us offers resistance when he is seized, or avenges himself for your unjust violence. Although our people are numerous and plentiful, it is not lawful for us to hate. And so we please God more when we render no requital for injury. We repay your hatred with kindness. Saint Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, died 258 AD. We Christians are a peaceful race, for it is not in war but in peace that we are trained. Clement of Alexandria, 150 AD to 214 AD. Only without the sword can the Christian wage war. The Lord has abolished the sword. Tertullian, 160 AD to 220 AD. You cannot demand military service of Christians any more than you can of priests. We do not go forth as soldiers with the emperor even if he demands this. Origen, 185-254 AD. We who formerly treasured money and possessions more than anything else now hand over everything we have to a treasury for all and share it with everyone who needs it. We who formerly hated and murdered one another now live together and share the same table. We pray for our enemies and try to win those who hate us. Justin the Martyr, 100 AD to 165 AD. Are you hearing a pattern here, folks? For what war should we not be fit and eager, even though unequal in numbers, we who are so willing to be slaughtered, if according to that discipline of ours It was not more lawful to be slain than to slay. Tertullian, 160-220 AD. The professions and trades of those who are going to be accepted into the community must be examined. The nature and type of each must be established. Brothel, sculptors of idols, charioteer, athlete, gladiator—give it up or be rejected. A military constable must be forbidden to kill; neither may he swear. If he is not willing to follow these instructions, he must be rejected. A proconsul or magistrate who wears the purple and governs by the sword shall give it up or be rejected. Anyone taking or already baptized who wants to become a soldier shall be sent away, for he has despised God. Hippolytus, 170 AD to 236 AD. Now it's interesting too when it says there that Neither may he swear. This doesn't mean like don't say a cuss word. They could not swear by the government. They couldn't pledge their allegiance. They couldn't swear to the government. They couldn't give themselves in that way because it's always been forbidden for Christians to do, to pledge their allegiance to the empire or a nation. Christ, in disarming Peter, disarmed every soldier. Tertullian 1:16. AD. Christians love all people and are persecuted by all. They are reviled and they bless. They are insulted and they are respectful. Epistle of Mathetes of Diogenetes, late 2nd century. So I'm gonna read just a few more of these, but I think you get the picture. I could read these all day. There are literally page after page after page of Christian writings on these from the early church, from the students of the apostles. It is the Christians, O Emperor, who have sought and found the truth, for they acknowledge God. They show love to their neighbors. They do not do to one another what they would wish not to have done to themselves. They speak gently to those who oppress them, and in this way they make them their friends. It has become their passion to do good to their enemies. This, O Emperor, is the rule of Life of the Christians, and This is Their Manner of Life. That was Arist— I'm gonna say it wrong— Aristides, written around 137 AD. And then there's just a lot more I could go on to. I am a Christian. He who answers thus has declared everything at once: his country, his profession, family. The believer belongs to no city on earth but to the heavenly Jerusalem. St. John Chrysostom, 347-407 AD. Maybe just one more. If anyone be a soldier or in authority, let him be taught not to oppress or to kill or to rob or to be angry or to rage and afflict anyone. But let those rations suffice him which are given to him. But if they wish to be baptized in the Lord, let them cease from military service or from the post of authority, and if not, let them not be received. Let a catechumen or a believer of the people, if he desire to be a soldier, either cease from his intention, or if not, let him be rejected. For he hath despised God by his thought, and leaving the things of the spirit, he hath perfected himself in the flesh, and hath treated the faith with contempt. The Testament of Our Lord, 4th or 5th century AD document. And you know, Origen has a good one too. Maybe we can close here. "We have become sons of peace for the sake of Jesus who is our leader." Origen, 185-254 AD. So there are many more things we could go into. It merits a lot more study. Oh no, I want to end with one last thing. The Didache, the teachings of the 12 apostles. And you can find this online really cheap if you don't have a copy. I highly recommend it to you.. These are the earliest teachings of the disciples that we have, and I would recommend it to you. This will be the last quote I'll end with. I've read the Didache and continue to go back to it again and again because I want to know what early church worship was like, and there are instructions in there for how we should worship and the teachings of the church, and they are directly given to us from the 12 apostles. So it says this: This is the way of life: first, thou shalt love the God who made thee; secondly, thy neighbor as thyself. And all things whatsoever thou wouldst not should happen to thee, do not thou to another. The teaching of these words is this: bless those who curse you, and pray for your enemies, and fast on behalf of those who persecute you. For what thanks will be due to you, if ye love only those who love you? Do not the Gentiles also do the same? But love ye those who hate you, and ye shall not have an enemy. And that's from the Didache, also known as the Teachings of the Twelve Apostles. It's an early Christian document written between 80 AD and 90 AD. So there's a lot to think about today. Those are not easy words from the early church fathers, but they are the words that formed and shaped the New Testament that we have today. They are the words that formed and shaped our creeds. And there's a lot to ponder there, a lot for us to think about. I'm sure you can find opposing viewpoints to those things as well. You always can. But these are some of the early church fathers who are held up the most by the church. And I think it's important that as we have these conversations together, we don't all have to come to the same conclusion, but we should agree to the conversation. And I think that if the apostles and their students don't have authority in the church to talk to us about the Savior that they walked with and served with and learned from, then I wonder why we should have any authority, or any of us who are writing and talking about it today. If we aren't willing to give credence to them, why are we to say that we have more authority? And, you know, it's an interesting conversation to have. So I guess I will close today by asking this question again: Are we going for the fire and the fury of the Empire or the grace and the mercy of Jesus? As the church, what would Jesus lead us to? I was thinking as I was closing this podcast out today of a quote by one of my favorite theologians, Stanley Hauerwas. I hope I am going to get it correct. Says, "The church does not have an alternative to war. The church is the alternative to war." And with that, I will leave you to think through these things today. You can send me feedback, as always, through my website at rickleejames.com. Whether you agree, whether you disagree, I'd love to hear why you agree and why you disagree. We definitely can have some fruitful dialogue over this, and I certainly don't think you have to agree with me. I suppose you don't have to agree with the Bible or the church fathers either. You can just— we can just agree and disagree all over the place. I guess it is part of being who we are as people. We can agree and disagree, but hopefully we can strive together to be people who seek after the truth. That is my hope. I thank you for listening to Voices in My Head this week. I will do my best to be back here with you again next week. So, have a great week. Thanks for listening. God bless you and take care of yourselves. Thank you for joining me here this week on the Voices in My Head podcast. I hope you'll visit me on my website at rickleejames.com, follow me on Twitter @RickLeeJames, like my artist page on Facebook at facebook.com/rickleejames, and keep up to date on what I'm writing at my author page on amazon.com. Make sure to follow my calendar on the website, and if you would like to have me come to your town to do a concert, a speaking engagement, or a book event, you can book me through my website by clicking on the link for Pare Booking Agency. That's P-A-R-E Booking. And finally, it would mean the world to me if you were to leave me a review of this podcast on iTunes. The more positive reviews that we receive, the more visible this podcast is on the internet. And now the benediction. May the God of peace, who raised Christ from the dead, strengthen your inner being for every good work. And may the blessing of God Almighty, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, rest upon you and dwell within you this day and forevermore. Amen.