It is loving to protect and defend the defenseless, and it is also loving to protect a wicked person, an enemy if you will, from killing others—to bring that person to the point where they lay down their arms and give up their own evil ends. Thus, God has appointed and legitimized government authorities for this purpose; it is loving to defend the defenseless and the evil person from carrying out wickedness.

Note: Daniel Rowlands served more than two decades in the United States Army as a helicopter and airplane pilot. He holds Master of Arts degrees in Biblical Studies and Theological Studies from Westminster Seminary California.
In response to the article “Christians and the Military,” the following comment was submitted by a Beautiful Christian Life reader:
I just read the article written today by Daniel Rowlands entitled “Christians and the Military.” I notice that there was no mention or comment about some of the most pertinent verses in the New Testament, Matthew 5:43-46, wherein Jesus himself commands us to love our enemies and do good to them. I would really appreciate Daniel’s perspective on this. Thank you very much. God Bless!
Dear Reader,
Surely this is an important topic since there are so many Christians serving in military forces around the world. As you correctly point out, Christians are called to love our enemies and to do good to them, even as God loved us while we were his enemies (Rom. 5:8-10). God is compassionate, merciful, and loving toward us.
God’s Moral Law That Teaches Us Not to Kill Also Carries with It the Value of Human Life
On the other hand, God is also just—the perfectly righteous judge. He has appointed government authorities as the means of carrying out his justice in this fallen world (e.g., Rom. 13:4). God’s moral law that teaches us not to kill also carries with it the value of human life. It includes the loving command to protect people from others who want to injure or kill them—to place a high value on all human life, even the lives of our enemies who are made in the likeness of God (James 3:9).
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In Scripture God very specifically addresses the matter of using his name in a reverent manner:
“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.”Exodus 20:7
“It is the LORD your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear.”Deuteronomy 6:13
In the Third Commandment God forbids using his name vainly, but does that include taking an oath in God’s name as is often done in courts of law, entering government service, and in marriage vows?
We should never take oaths lightly.
Essentially, an oath is calling out to God who knows our heart and the truth of what we affirm. The Heidelberg Catechism, first published in 1563, is a highly regarded summary of the Christian faith and has the following to say about the Third Commandment:
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Paul, in his first letter to the Corinthians, testified that the resurrected Christ Jesus appeared not only to the apostles but also to more than 500 other people (1 Cor. 15:6)! There were quite a few witnesses whom skeptics could examine, but instead of fading away as a conspiracy, the truth of Jesus’ resurrection was so strong that the church continued to grow and the gospel of Christ Jesus spread from Jerusalem and the Mediterranean beyond into Europe.

Is Christianity private or public? Does the truth about Christ Jesus, who is the object of my faith, depend on my own private beliefs, or is there something verifiable that can be “fact-checked”? The reason I pose these questions is because we are living in a time when the determination of truth and untruth have turned inward, making one’s own personal beliefs the measure of what is true or not.
While examining and verifying evidence and testimony may be found in courts of law, in the press and many political and personal interactions it is common to observe persons passing off as truth what are merely their own feelings, opinions, and beliefs, often without evidence or verifiable testimony.
The resurrection of Jesus was a very public miracle.
Not so with the resurrection of Christ Jesus. The resurrection of Jesus was a very public miracle witnessed by many and supported by evidence at the time it occurred and afterward. The evidence is recorded in Scripture. There are about 5,250 ancient Greek manuscripts of books and parts of the New Testament that record Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. The earliest is dated to about 90 years after his death (Rylands Library Papyrus 52).
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God’s Word is the means by which God works in you both to will and to do his good pleasure, purifying you by his work of sanctification through faith in your Savior, Jesus Christ. This is the fear of God that is clean and endures forever.

We often think of “fear” in a negative sense—being afraid even to the point of terror or feeling high anxiety and worry, especially toward the unknown. Yet, we are called to fear God, which is right and good. Is there a difference between fear of God and fear of the unknown, and why does the Bible call the fear of God “clean” in Psalm 19:9?

…the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring foreverthe rules of the LORD are true,and righteous altogether. — Psalm 19:9

The psalmist writes that the fear of God is “clean” in Psalm 19:9 in the context of God’s righteous and perfect word—his commandments, rules, and laws. In other words, as God is pure and holy, so is his word. Fear of God means to revere, respect, and submit to his word because it is holy as God is holy.
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 “Catholic” simply means the universal church of Christ Jesus, which consists of all believers in him from every time and place. All people throughout the ages who have placed their faith in Christ Jesus for salvation from sin and death are members of his universal (that is, catholic) church.

When saying the Apostles’ Creed, which is an historical, concise, and biblical summary of the Christian faith, we state that we believe in “the holy catholic church.” What does this mean?
For Christians who are unfamiliar with the Apostles’ Creed, what often comes to mind is the Roman Catholic Church, but this would be an incorrect interpretation of of the meaning of the word “catholic.”
The Heidelberg Catechism, first published in 1563, is a highly regarded summary of the Christian faith. A portion of the Heidelberg Catechism is an explanation of the Apostles’ Creed, which begins each section with the words, “I believe.” In question and answer 54, the Heidelberg Catechism asks what we believe concerning “the holy catholic church”:
Q. What do you believe concerning “the holy catholic church”?
A. I believe that the Son of God through his Spirit and Word, out of the entire human race, from the beginning of the world to its end, gathers, protects, and preserves for himself a community chosen for eternal life and united in true faith. And of this community I am and always will be a living member.”—The Heidelberg Catechism, Q & A 54.
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No true picture of Jesus exists, so the ones artists do make merely reflect the artist’s own image of our Savior rather than what God has sovereignly revealed by his word. An image also cannot truly reflect the deity of Christ , only his humanity, which again serves only to limit our knowledge of Christ Jesus. Believe God and trust him when he forbids images and reveals to us that faith comes by hearing, not by sight.

The second of the Ten Commandments directs us against images. It expressly forbids the use of images in the worship of God. But does this means images such as pictures to help us learn about God are also forbidden?
We must be careful to avoid placing our own wisdom and desires above God’s.
The plain teaching of Scripture forbids the use of visual images in regard to the worship of God:
“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.” (Exod. 20:4)
In fact, the Bible also is clear that faith comes by hearing, not by sight:
So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. (Rom. 10:17)
…for we walk by faith, not by sight. (2 Cor. 5:7)
God has chosen to reveal himself by means of the spoken word.
It is not by the sight of pictures or other visual forms that a person comes to faith, but by God’s appointed means of hearing his word, the gospel message.
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It is good to mourn our sins in confession, regretting the pain we have caused others and ourselves. It is right to have a healthy desire to be taught by God—to have the discipline of a loving father. Yet, in our weakness God shows forth his glory in the love and forgiveness we have in Christ Jesus who paid the penalty of our sins by his death on the cross, and “we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us” (2 Cor. 4:7).

Although we may not be acutely aware of every sin, our conscience testifies to our sense of weakness and failure. In particular, our memories remind us of times in our lives when we may have sinned miserably—angry tempers, selfishness, divorce, harshness, neglect of children or parents, and pride are just a few transgressions we may have committed.
We recognize how the trials we have brought upon ourselves have originated in our own sin. Yet the Lord uses them to train us, to discipline us. The author of Hebrews declares:

And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.” It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? (Heb. 12:5-7)

1. The Discipline of a Loving Father
It is good to self-examine and learn from our failures. Yet, perhaps more important than lessons learned is the question: how is God glorified in this? Is it possible that even in our self-inflicted trials—when we are acutely aware of our fallen, sinful nature—the glory of God is manifested by his work in and for us? Absolutely.
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Scripture is the word of God, which he has spoken and which has been written down by humans and inspired by the Holy Spirit, we read his word considering both the immediate context of the human writers and the unifying context of the divine author. This is not an either/or argument but is both/and—human and divine. It is God’s word—his divine revelation to us and received by us through his instrument of human writers.

It is common to hear admonishments to read the Bible and interpret it in context; that is, that we ought to avoid detaching a particular verse, story, or portion of Scripture from the immediate and original context in which it was written. An accurate meaning of words, verses, and stories may be found only as understood in context.
For example, “He hit a home run,” may mean different things depending on whether it was written in the context of a business presentation or a baseball game. “Out of Egypt I have called my son,” has meaning in light of its Matthew 2 and Hosea 11 contexts. On the other hand, in Exodus God identifies Israel, while they were enslaved in Egypt, as his firstborn son (Exod. 4:22).
In each place there is the immediate context, but there is a broader context—the context of the entire revelation of God contained in the Bible. There are different human authors (i.e. Moses, Hosea, and Matthew), yet there is one divine author—God himself. There is an immediate context, and there is an overall biblical context—the overarching story of God’s mighty acts of redemption in Christ Jesus.
The Word of God was written by both humans and a divine author.
Though we may be tempted at times to overemphasize the human author over the divine author, or the divine over the human, it is important to understand both together as we strive to accurately understand the word of God. Questions include, how are the two writers related to one another? How do they work together in Scripture? Is the Bible a human book, written merely by human authors, or is it a divine book supernaturally dictated to men of old? The answers are found in Scripture itself, which reveals that the Word of God was written by both humans and a divine author—every word is simultaneously human and divine.
Let’s consider 2 Peter 1:21 concerning the nature of prophecy:

For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

The word of God in the Bible comes to us through human writers. We find the humanity of the writers in variations of vocabulary, idioms, structure, and style. For example, there is the difference between the exquisite Hebrew poetry and varied vocabulary of Isaiah and the straight-forward narrative of Joshua. Similarly, in the New Testament there is the difference between the complex and elegant Greek of Hebrews and John’s more elementary Greek. We can detect the presence of the human authors throughout all of Scripture.
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The very first fallacy theologian D. A. Carson lists in his classic book Exegetical Fallacies is “the root fallacy.” What is the root fallacy and why is it of such importance to merit being first of many potential errors we risk committing while interpreting what the Bible says and means?
The etymology of a word is its history of development over time.
In short, Dr. Carson defines the root fallacy as determining the meaning of a word in the Bible by its etymology or component parts. The etymology of a word is like its genealogy—its history of development over time. For example, consider how English words have changed over the years.
“Awful” used to mean full of awe and worthy of respect or honor. However, awful now tends to mean terrible or bad. In fact, “terrible” once had a meaning similar to “awe” and “wonder”; but the negative side of the word has won out, and today it means something extremely bad. Word meanings change over time as cultural usage redefines them.
This brings us to the root fallacy of biblical interpretation—exegetical root fallacy.
How does someone commit the error of the exegetical root fallacy?
When people try to define the meaning of a biblical word by appealing to its etymology (its history of how a word’s meaning changes over time) or to its component parts, they are committing the error of exegetical root fallacy. They are trying to say a word now means such and such because its meaning used to be such and such or because its parts mean such and such.

Our hope is in God, just as it was for Ahaz. If we are to stand in the days of our own troubles, we must be firm in the faith. We must trust our Lord God, the sovereign ruler of all creation, because he is faithful to his promises. We can trust that God will continue to keep all his promises.

In our own day there is much to be afraid of. Many of us have experienced not only the recent pandemic but also violence, turmoil, broken families, tragedy, illness, death of loved ones, political upheavals, and an uncertain future. How can Christians be firm in faith when they are fearful?
Our hope is in God, just as it was for Ahaz in the book of Isaiah.
In chapter seven of the book of Isaiah, King Ahaz was experiencing fear of the unknown and the anxiety about what was coming next as he faced an impending attack and siege against Jerusalem. But God sent his prophet Isaiah to him to tell him not to fear. God ends his encouragement to Ahaz with a short and memorable principle. Capturing the meaning well, the New International Version translates Isaiah 7:9b as follows,

“If you do not stand firm in your faith, you will not stand at all.”

This is a call for Ahaz—and us—to believe and to trust God. It is a call to put away the fear and anxiety and to “be careful, be quiet, not fear, and not let your heart be faint” (Isa. 7:4).
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