Jesus may have come to bring a sword but most fundamentalists prefer the cold steel of a Colt .45. Throw a rock into any crowd of fundamentalists (if you dare!) and you’ll hit a gun aficionado with surprising frequency.
It’s not quite clear why God and Guns go together in fundy circles. But with things waxing worse and worse and the great whore of Babylon, the beast, and the false prophet predicted to show up any time to do some creative redecorating, it makes good sense to hedge your bets in case things get really hairy before the rapture. Even if nothing happens, you still get to play with things that make loud noises and can wipe out your neighborhood if needed. It’s a win-win.
Blessed are the Peacemakers.
I <3 guns.
“Blesses are the Peacemakers” HAHAHA! That’s funny. And I’m a fundamentalist Baptist! It’s true though, and a bit sad. I have some guns but they’re farm guns, to keep the ravens and open range cattle off the property. I drew it once when someone was driving down our back road at night, shooting their guns off into the bushes, but just to protect my wife, who as with me-never shot, just being ready.
Way behind comment. Blessed are the peacemakers is classic! Peacemakers obv being synonomous with widowmakers!
god, guns, and guts made America free, let’s keep all three.
Sorry for the late comment. My dad (a fundy preacher) used to gripe that too many preachers carried a piece when they were supposed to be preaching peace.
Ask J. Frank Norris how having a gun in his desk at his church office worked out for him.
My former fundy CEO is a proud gun man who likens his right to bear arms with justification by faith.
I’m not anti-gun, just don’t raise guns to the level of the great doctrines of the New Testament or the Mosaic law.
(P.S. I know, I’m 5 1/2 years after the post. It’s been a blast going through all the old posts and seeing how things have developed)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/for-many-at-liberty-university-guns-and-god-go-hand-in-hand/2015/12/14/3251bfb2-9fc9-11e5-a3c5-c77f2cc5a43c_story.html
I have to wonder what guns contribute to the gospel. Not that I am totally opposed to guns. I have friends that hunt (but not with AR-15s). It just seems that “blow ’em to hell” is inconsistent with “For God so loved the world.”
Jesus said, “If my kingdom were of this world then my servants would fight. But it isn’t.” So why do we Christians seem to believe we have to be the predators?
I’m not talking about banning guns. I’m not talking about national policy. I just want to know. What about the gun culture is remotely connected to Christianity?
I don’t get gun culture, either. The same people that say Christians have no rights come positively unglued if you take away their “right” to own a firearm that can take out a room of people with large capacity clips.
I understand hunting and I understand target practice, but I don’t understand having a home arsenal. If you cite the statistics on suicide in homes with firearms, or the unregistered guns involved in crimes, they say it doesn’t matter. I think they put more faith in their guns than they do in the Savior who gave up His rights and died for their sins.
On the flip side, I do get a bit tired of Christians making such a big fuss about their rights as Americans. Like Pastor Steven Anderson who got all arrogant and cocky with the checkpoint agents and got himself arrested. Or the street preachers making assholes of themselves and disturbing the peace when people are trying to enjoy their vacations on the beach or at a craft fair. Then when confronted by the police, they hide behind free speech, because they care more about their own rights than the rights of their unwilling audiences. Not to mention these guys that open carry an AR15 down a busy street just to exercise their right to bear arms and scare all the local residents in the process.
Jesus didn’t die so we could be assholes and whine about are rights as Americans.
He died to bring us abundant life both now and in eternity.
the Admiral
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Yup. Just about the truth. Too many people crying over their rights and not about the lives lost.
I still want to know what it is about the gun culture that is “Christian.”
On the surface, it’s not. It doesn’t fit with the Scripture that tells us to turn the other cheek or to do to others as we would want done to us. (If I were committing a home invasion, I wouldn’t want to be shot — ha. I’m being ridiculous on purpose.) However, there are also Bible verses that support protecting and defending those for whom you are responsible. Jesus Himself said in Luke 22:36 for his listeners to get a sword. When the soldiers asked John the Baptist what they should do in Luke 3, he didn’t tell them that they couldn’t be soldiers. (Of course, John was a precursor to Christ.)
I think a lot of things in Scripture require balance and wisdom, not turning off the path to the right or to the left. I think there are a lot of aspects of faith that we struggle with. I do want to follow Christ with all my heart, but if my children’s lives were threatened, I would kill to defend them if I had to. (OK, “threatened” sounds too vague; how about “if my children were in imminent danger of death at the violent hands of a criminal”?) And because my Christianity teaches me to value others, I should also be willing to defend YOUR children too, not just my own.
Then why not take it a step further and protect the life of the murderer? I can see some people loving that person’s soul so much that they would die first, not wanting that person to die and go to hell. But I think the God who tells us in Jeremiah and elsewhere to defend the innocent does allow us to protect ourselves from evil.
Good points, PW. There is a difference between defending yourself and defending others. Is it ever inappropriate to defend others with deadly force when the threat is equal or greater? The appropriateness of self-defense should be at the discretion of the one under threat, though I do wish fewer people had the mindset of ‘shoot first, ask questions later’. On the other end of the spectrum is the person who refuses to defend self and/or others when they are able. “Coward” is a convenient label for them, but I wouldn’t use it without knowing all the facts (and even then only on myself). It’s a complex issue, to be sure!
Pastor’s Wife, I completely and cheerfully agree that Jesus told His disciples to get and take swords.
But, as Paul Harvey used to point out, we need the rest of the story.
They carried those swords. Then when Peter tried to use the sword in defense of Jesus or for self-defense, Jesus told him to put it away. “All those who live by the sword will perish by the sword.” Jesus even healed the ear of the person Peter wounded so that the big, bad group that had come armed to the teeth would have no damage.
I believe Jesus gave His disciples an object lesson. Weapons of warfare don’t protect. Not ultimately. And if we are to love our neighbors as ourselves, then whose life is more important?
Jesus also said (somewhere, I don’t have my Bible out at the moment) that those who would save their lives would really lose them, but those who lose their lives for Christ’s sake would find them.
For hundreds of years after Christ in the face of persecution, Christians were known as pacifists. They wouldn’t fight! They wouldn’t take the lives of their enemies. And Christianity grew as people saw that self-sacrificing faith in the lives of people who, as in Romans 8, acknowledged they were sheep for the slaughter, but ever lived in the love of God.
I wish I had faith like that. Today’s notion of faith is pitiful, weak, selfish, and it is no wonder the world sees Fundamentalist kinds of faith as horrible.
Jesus died for me, even though I was a sinner and an enemy against him. Aren’t we supposed to give our lives for others? Or have we, as American Christians, excised those ideas from the Bible? I sure didn’t hear any preaching on them during my stay in Fundystan.
Remember, none of what I said here is an accusation about anything you or others here have said. We’re friends!
rtg:
To answer your question directly, I don’t think there is anything particularly Christian about the gun culture. But I don’t think it is unChristian to own guns for hunting, sport or self defense. A gun is a tool like a car or a machete. All 3 can be used for good, but they also can each be used for evil. In and of themselves they are neither moral, nor immoral.
the Admiral
On the flip side, I do get a bit tired of Christians making such a big fuss about their rights as Americans. Like Pastor Steven Anderson who got all arrogant and cocky with the checkpoint agents and got himself arrested. Or the street preachers making assholes of themselves and disturbing the peace when people are trying to enjoy their vacations on the beach or at a craft fair. Then when confronted by the police, they hide behind free speech, because they care more about their own rights than the rights of their unwilling audiences. Not to mention these guys that open carry an AR15 down a busy street just to exercise their right to bear arms and scare all the local residents in the process.
Jesus didn’t die so we could be assholes and whine about are rights as Americans.
He died to bring us abundant life both now and in eternity.
the Admiral
That’s not a Colt .45. That is a Glock, and it’s probably a 17, although it could be a 22. So probably 9mm; maybe .40 S&W. And for what it’s worth, Colt .45 refers to a cheap beer, but when used to refer to guns it references the .45 Long Colt (LC); you probably meant .45 Automatic Colt Pistol (ACP). For what it’s worth, I can drive nails at 25 yards with my Sig .45; but I prefer my Glock 26 with extended magazine and grip extension for concealed carry. I’m almost as quick on the draw and deadly with it as my wife is with her S&W M&P 9c. Yeah. Don’t piss her off.
I used to target shoot with my brother-in-law. He was more experienced and a gun collector. But I did pretty good on the target range.
When I left my former Fundy church I was not aware of any extreme gun culture, beyond the basic “support the 2nd amendment” stuff. As the years passed, I noticed a lot more gun extremism has crept in.
People posting pics of guns, pro-gun memes, paranoia about their guns being taken away. Some downright fanatical.
I have noticed the creep. To me it feels like fundamentalists have decided that Christianity is pro-business, pro-rich (and virulently anti-help for the poor), pro-gun, pro-death penalty, anti-government, white, Republican and utterly selfish in an “everyone else can go to hell for all I care” attitude.
Almost as if the more extreme, angry, and inhumane to chosen out-groups, the better.
And I am reminded that the militia that took over the federal buildings in Oregon was mostly Mormon. Interesting. The white racist militia groups up in Idaho are mostly Mormon, too. Hmmm. And fundamentalist Mormons have a lot in common with fundamentalists in general. IFB or otherwise.
Unbelievably, I have seen a few Fundies post in support of that Oregon militia group. Guess they have stopped caring about the rule of law. Also, some have spoken of wanting to retire in places like Idaho, Wyoming, Texas, etc. They want to get out of our “liberal” state.
Any state completely controlled by fundamentalists will become a dictatorship. It is inevitable. They want their freedoms but do not want others to have them.
So we have quite a dilemma.
Now that Trump is heading the the house with no pigmentation, fundies can now rest easy.
B.R.1