A rant : "spiritual warfare"

i’m happy to sing onward christian soldiers with the best of them, and am very very aware this is war. but army teaching without a strong basis of love in action teaching underlying it strikes me as lazy and downright dangerous. i’m really angry about the loose way we go about spiritual warfare like it’s a video game. i’m aware i’m preaching to the converted here, but i’m going to have a little rant anyway if you dont mind ?

these are people’s lives we’re messing with. and we dont learn our lessons ! we prayed down the iron curtain. arent we clever. but we just assumed that having more contact with our society was adequate to put in the place of communism. of all the arrogant stupid assumptions ! why did the russian revolution happen in the first place ? autocratic and ruthless rulers ran a vampire rule in the country. someone prayed it down. fine. then the communists did some good but slipped into exactly the same model. now putin is in the same model. the house was left empty and the same strong man came back with his mates. and our westernism is just feeding that, not helping. so the poor stay just as poor.

and where were we ?
where were we ? 

i was in poland in 1990 on a ywam outreach – i didnt plan it that way, no credit to me, it’s just that’s what the team off the anastasis did. we came back through east berlin. i brought home bits of berlin wall. in poland i’ve never known street evangelism like it. we got and kept a crowd every time. in the whole 6 weeks we found just one leaflet left on the ground afterwards. people came back for more of these dull little papers with bible verses on and stuffed them in handbags and inner jacket pockets like they were treasure. an old bloke stood and ignored the whole of our dynamic presentation – he was just reading and reading the bible tract in his hand. we didnt meet much else in the way of christians. but we met loads of JWs. they had had special leaflets printed years previously and teams waiting trained and ready on the assumption that teh wall would open up one day !! the poles were open to us, but open to everything. in full public view on a market stall we saw a big crowd gathered. on looking closer there were a few porn mags. everyone wanted to see them. they were open to everything. anything.

and where were we ?
where were we ?

we put all that effort into praying down the wall from the comfort of our church prayer meetings but we were not ready to go into the void that we left. no follow through, no follow up. a bit of money to build church buildings. a little bit of charity. yes life is better behind where the wall was for some, it wasnt totally wasted, but it was the big opportunity.

and where were we ?

where were we ?

in japan straight after the war they actually requested christian missionaries. someone has quoted the figure of 10 000 being requested. 1000 went. they were open, the strong man was bound and where were we ?

the arab spring. we’re so clever, we’ve been praying down dictatorships. even sent in armies. but where are the christians ? where are the overseas students who’d been given hospitality in christian families when they were lonely abroad, who had been given leadership training and rebuilding skills, both christian and other wise. the romans wouldnt attack a country if they couldnt rule it afterwards. we are so short sighted !

maybe with the number of christian youngsters doing year out so they are more open to the rest of the world maybe we will be ready to go next time round? maybe ? maybe with the financial crisis we will have a more “semi-detatched” attitude to our riches ? maybe ? or will we do the same as we do with sickness and curse the illnesses for those lined up at the front till they obligingly fall over to show what great ministries we have, as a cheap and spectacular alternative to caring for the sick ? 

am i being a bit cynical ? yes of course i am. i will still happily go forward for prayer at the drop of a hat, if something is being offered i’m not going to miss out on one drop of blessing. i’ll sing in heavenly armour we’ll enter the land, or we’ll take this land for Jesus or whatever version they’re singing these days. but i want to see the follow through. i want to see the love that gives wheels to the works of power. same as i want to see the power that is the motor for the works of love. the problem as usual is the nut behind the steering wheel. God gives us driving lessons. why dont we get on with it.