Why Neither Nonviolence Nor Violence Are Ever The Right Strategies: The Great Insight That All Great Men Of History Can Only Ever Get From Jesus

Posted on October 19, 2012 by Pastor Foley

You might be surprised to see a piece on nonviolence materialize smack in the center of a month of posts on ransoming the captive, but this is actually right where it belongs.

Or, more accurately, doesn’t belong. Because on the basis of the posts we’ve laid out so far, we now have a sufficiently panoramic theological view to see why neither nonviolence nor violence are ever the right strategies for Christians when it comes to ransoming captives, and why Jesus truly is the only way to understand their strategic insufficiency.

As we talked about in the last post, the first rule of ransoming is to ransom the captor. It’s the revolutionary insight that evades videogamers and videogame creators everywhere: Mario should not seek to rescue Peach but should instead endeavor to set Donkey Kong free. Set Donkey Kong free and the endless levels of increasingly complex game play come, amazingly, to an end, no longer necessary.

Fanciful idealism? Hardly. It’s the great insight that’s woven into the very fabric of the universe–the only solution to ransoming the captives that does more than to displace, postpone, or exacerbate the otherwise intractable problem of captivity.

It is what Gandhi saw in Jesus that transformed his struggle against the British…into his struggle with the British for Indians and Brits to be set free, together.

It is what Martin Luther King saw in Jesus that transformed the American Civil Rights struggle as well. Once you see–really see–the captivity of those whom you were absolutely positive were your sworn enemies, nothing about the struggle can ever be the same again.

The insight, notably, has always come historically from people beholding Jesus and the way Jesus beheld his enemies–as captives even as they thought he himself was their captive–crying out to his father for them, not him, to be set free:

39 And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads 40 and saying, “You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.” 41 So also the chief priests, with the scribes and elders, mocked him, saying, 42 “He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. 43 He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he desires him. For he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’” (Matthew 27:39-43, ESV)

4 And Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34, ESV)

Regrettably, though great men apprehend much in beholding Jesus, there is one area where they still miss the essential Jesus (and thus, likely, his divinity). Our battle is not against flesh and blood: Correct. But this does not mean there is not a battle, and thus it does not mean that nonviolence is either the answer or even a viable strategy. There is a battle, of such magnitude and incomprehensible dimensions that it simply makes the fighting and nonfighting of humans silly and irrelevant.

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. (Ephesians 6:12, NIV)

The Scripture does not say we do not battle. To the contrary, it says that the battle is on–against the powers of this dark world and the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

And, incredulously, it says that we are the ones who battle against such forces. And this is why neither nonviolence nor violence are ever the right strategies, and why nonviolence is never advocated by Jesus or his immediate successors as the strategy; namely, earthly violence is simply on a different plane as heavenly powers or spiritual forces.

Mario can’t, in the terms of our diminutive example, set Donkey Kong free either through nonviolence or violence. They’re irrelevant–attempting either is a strategic category error. For  Donkey Kong to be set free, the software itself has to be rewritten–an intervention that is only possible from outside the frame of the game.

Nonviolence and violence describe the relationship between the avowed combatants in the contest. The recognition that combatants are actually co-captives is a epoch-shaking insight, to be sure. But by itself the insight remains pitifully insufficient to set captives free. It is why civil rights movements lead to advances but never quite to transformations.

No, nothing happens unless a force is definitively and permanently engaged from outside the frame. And the foundational testimony of the Christian faith is that there is but one such force: God himself.

And that is why Jesus acts neither nonviolently nor violently toward his captors as he hangs on the Cross. Instead, he acts toward the only force he ever acts in his life–the only force with which we ourselves should ever act in matters of ransoming the captive, or with regard to any matters at all:

44 It was now about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour, 45 while the sun’s light failed. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two. 46 Then Jesus, calling out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!” And having said this he breathed his last. (Luke 23:44-46, ESV)

It is only when we are finally disabused of our faith in both violence and nonviolence that we can definitively engage the battle and unleash the one and only power so disruptive that prisons can contain neither captives nor the praise of those who, set free, sing the song of triumph of our God.

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First Rule Of Ransoming: Always Ransom The One Who Is Most Captive, Namely, The Captor

Posted on October 17, 2012 by Pastor Foley

Three Scriptures receive virtually no attention in the study of the Work of Mercy of ransoming the captive and yet are indispensable to it.

The first is 1 Timothy 1:12-16 (ESV), where Paul doxologizes:

12 I thank him who has given me strength, Christ Jesus our Lord, because he judged me faithful, appointing me to his service, 13 though formerly I was a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief, 14 and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 15 The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost. 16 But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life.

The second is Ephesians 6:12 (ESV), where Paul contends:

12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

The third is Galatians 6:1 (ESV), where Paul exhorts:

Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted.

Put these all together and you get a fascinating–and fascinatingly neglected–3D Scriptural portrait of the Work of Mercy of ransoming the captive.

Rewind back to the first Scripture, 1 Timothy 1:12-16. Paul is referencing his Saul days, when he mercilessly persecuted the body of Christ. Did Jesus ransom the Christians who were captive to Saul? Yes. How?

By ransoming Saul himself.

Ephesians 6:12 explains why. It reminds us of an oft-forgotten or overlooked aspect of ransoming: The Work of ransoming goes deeper than the physical. Human beings don’t–can’t–control the power of sin and death, despite what we humans like to believe. Absent Christ’s intervention, sin and death control us. That is, the principalities and powers eat us for lunch.

The good news is that Christ’s death for sinners means full ransom for captives, not just the partial ransom of bodily freedom. As Jesus himself says (in Matthew 10:28), “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” 

When you put on these 3D glasses, captivity is fully unmasked: The captor, ultimately, is just another captive, despite what he wants to believe (and what he wants you to believe as he snarls at you menancingly, too). Saul, the captor of Christians, is revealed as Saul, the captive of sin. If Christ were to ransom the Christians but leave Saul captive, that would still be impressive. But as Paul points out in Romans 5:6-8 (ESV), Christ moves beyond impressive to downright divine:

6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Christ, in other words, regularly moves in a way contrary to human sight, understanding, and inclination, ransoming the one who is most captive, the captor himself. Reveal the captivity of the captor to the captor himself, set him free in Christ, and it is the captor himself who ministers to those whom he has been holding.

It’s a recurring theme in Scripture, like in the story of Paul and Silas and the Philippian jailer in Acts 16:25-34 (ESV):

25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them, 26 and suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken. And immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone’s bonds were unfastened. 27 When the jailer woke and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped. 28 But Paul cried with a loud voice, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.” 29 And the jailer called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear he fell down before Paul and Silas. 30 Then he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” 31 And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.” 32 And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. 33 And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds; and he was baptized at once, he and all his family. 34 Then he brought them up into his house and set food before them. And he rejoiced along with his entire household that he had believed in God.

And as we’ll see in our next post, it’s not a practice Christ discontinued once the Bible Days drew to a close.

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The Only Currency That’s Accepted Where Sin And Death Are Involved Is Divine Life

Posted on October 15, 2012 by Pastor Foley

Keep in mind as you read the sentence that follows that I get paid to travel around the world teaching Christian ministries how to raise money:

When it comes to ransoming the captive, money is part of the problem, not part of the solution.

A particular conceit among those of us in the top one percent of the world’s wealthiest people–by the way, that’s anyone making roughly US $38,500 or more a year–is that we are absolutely convinced that our wealth puts us in a particularly advantageous and responsible position to solve the world’s problems. “We have so much,” we sigh. “We really should do more to, you know, help those who don’t have anything.”

There’s certainly some truth to that, of course, but as Jesus points out to the rich young ruler, our usefulness to God typically comes after we divest ourselves of our wealth, not during the process of our divestment. “Sell all you have, give it to the poor, and then come and follow me,” he says, not “Come and follow me by selling all you have and giving it to the poor. You have so much, and I really need you to help those who, you know, my Father and I failed to provide for in the first place.”

I still recall when I started working with North Korean Christians. I asked them, “How can we pray for you?” And they said, “You pray for us? We pray for you!” “Why would you pray for me?” I asked, incredulously. I’m the rich and free guy here, I wanted to say. You’re the poor folks in bondage. And as if they read my mind, they replied, “Because you Americans and Koreans put so much faith in your wealth and freedom to solve problems. But until you have neither wealth nor freedom, you don’t know what it’s like to depend fully on God and to discover that he is able.”

Spiritual problems require spiritual wealth to effect a solution. Not just a spiritual solution but a whole life solution, for body, soul, and spirit. Because captivity is a whole life problem, not just a body issue.

Given that human beings are bereft of spiritual wealth, there is only one source for it–the very source that is typically dismissed as only an inspiration, an accountability factor, or a benevolent but distant being in the day-to-day grind of ransoming the captive.

Think about it: Given what we know about God, it would be peculiar indeed if he set up the world in such a way that it relied on the money of the rich to solve its problems. It would be peculiar indeed if he set up the world in such a way that rich people were somehow in a better or more important or more influential position to accomplish his purposes than poor people. Not quite what we, you know, see in the Scriptures.

And so as we consider the Work of Mercy of ransoming the captive, it’s important to remind ourselves that if ransoming the captive requires you to have a lot of money to do it right, then it is a Work that is restricted to the rich, and that would mean that this means of grace–this way of coming to know God more deeply and fully–is not available to the poor.

Since we know that can’t be the case, that’s our major clue that ransoming the captive can’t be about buying people out of prison or brothels. It must be about something else.

And indeed it is. As Scripture makes clear from end to end, the only currency that’s accepted where sin and death are involved is divine life. Captivity by definition involves sin and death. As such, divine life must be at the center of any serious effort to ransom the captive. The old saying “You can’t take it with you” has a corollary: You can’t buy people’s freedom with it either. As Moses’ life attests, when you take the work of ransoming captives into your own hands and out of God’s, people end up dead and you end up in the desert. Forty year sentence, baby.

So when we are seeking to effect the release of 13 year old Nan from the brothel, the length, breadth, and depth of the Work of Mercy of ransoming the captive must entail the application of divine life. It can’t be centered on the $80 ransom the pimp is requiring (and the nonprofit is asking you to contribute). It can’t even be about praying that God will move the heart of the pimp to accept our $80. The only force capable of setting captives free is the Cross of Christ.

How to apply that in the context of 13 year old Nan held captive in the brothel? Hang on for our next post.

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