The Unacceptable Cost of Christian Zionism; Its Legacy of Pain
Good evening fellow followers of Jesus\’ teaching.
Robert Service, a tough guy poet of the Alaskan gold rush who served as an ambulance driver in World War I but refused to enter combat, wrote these words 93 years ago.
Far and near, high and clear,
Hark to the call of War.
Over the gorse and the golden dells,
Ringing and swinging the clamorous bells,
Praying and saying of wild farewells:
War! War! War!
Today the people of Egypt have revolted against a tyrant who has repressed them and helped Israel repress Gaza Arabs into bondage worse than any Pharaoh ever did. As I speak to you, American National Guard units have been activated to go to Egypt. Will they help free the people? Sadly, our own history tells us they go to support a new Egyptian tyrant, just as they support the puppet governments of Iraq and Afghanistan, and every act of Israel.
Since World War I, war and preparation for more war has never stopped for a single generation. As an American-born follower of Christ, I place the blame for the victims of serial wars at home and abroad, and for the destroyed dreams of the suffering people in Gaza and Cairo, on church leaders–not all of them, but many. They alone have the responsibility to know the truth and tell it, regardless of the cost. They must respect life as a gift from God. War respects no life.
Truth is the product of Jesus’ work. But those who preach from mega-church pulpits claiming to follow Jesus have been playing the Monopoly war game with the bankers and politicians. Please stop following them! No religious sect has ever been more clearly responsible for so much bloodshed and destruction as “Christian-Zionism.” This 100-year old departure from fundamental Christianity has almost single-handedly legitimized wars upon Arab people since January 1991.
Individuals within this Judeo-Christian movement are almost always motivated by altruistic religious belief. I learned this the hard way, by being one of the misguided on the receiving end of this false teaching. The driving force behind its leaders is almost always tainted by money, power, and fame. Southern Baptist pastor Jerry Falwell (who died in 2007) may have been the first leader to recognize the potential for linking dispensational Christianity with Zionism and harnessing this combined power into a political movement. In the early 1980s, Falwell called his fledgling army “The Moral Majority.” It was later referred to as the “Christian Right.”
Here are essential facts about Christian Zionism
First: It must be understood that the names by which ideas are known change. What I call Judeo-christianity was once “evangelicalism,” then "dispensationalism," and finally “Christian Zionism, a 20th Century phenomena that has led millions of Christians to deviate from Christ’s narrow path.
Second: Judeo-christianity ascribes holiness to a foreign political state- Israel – as though Israel itself is a god to be worshipped. It places today’s political state of Israel on the throne alongside Jesus Christ, and in so doing, its teachers ignore and sometimes annul Jesus’ teachings.
Third: Judeo-christian pastors and churchgoers think of themselves as moral, even when they are actively contributing to immoral acts, such as supporting mass military execution of civilians in Lebanon and Gaza. They do not consider these acts immoral because they believe all events are ordained by God, and therefore, they must not ever interfere with what they call "God\’s plan." This leads them to think they should do nothing to improve the crimes committed by the Israelis or their American enablers. Traditional Christians believe they can and must do so.
Four: Judeo-christianity is a much larger and more powerful political movement than generally believed and is active in every state and community in the United States. During CNN\’S six-hour television feature, God\’s Warriors, host CNN chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour stated in the introductory segment: “A recent poll found that 59 percent of American evangelicals believe Israel is the fulfillment of biblical prophecy. She also asserted: “The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs estimates 85 million evangelicals believes God tells them to support Israel — more than six times the world\’s Jewish population."
Church-going Americans are not only putting themselves in debt for war, spending for foreign wars millions of dollars that should be being spent for peaceful purposes; they are supplying their sons and daughters to kill and be killed, maim and be maimed. A disproportionately large number of the American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan are Judeo-christians. The wars they are fighting are not Christian and not moral. They are lambs that have been brought to a slaughter.
I will close where I began, with another verse from Robert Service\’s War, War, War, about a father waiting for a letter from the front that will never come.
What is the matter, Young Fellow My Lad?
No letter again to-day.
Why did the postman look so sad,
And sigh as he turned away?
Well, I hear them tell that we\’ve gained new ground,
But a terrible price we\’ve paid:
God grant, my boy, that you\’re safe and sound;
But oh I\’m afraid, afraid.
