Thursday 27 September 2012

The Ethics of War and Colonisation

Is it ethical for one country to go to war with another? Can there ever be circumstances in which it might have been ethical for one country to colonise another country, set-up government and occupy their land?

In the Bible, judgement was sometimes executed by war and colonisation. So the real question is not, Is war okay, is colonisation okay; but, Is judgement called for.

The book of Hebrews mentions "eternal judgement". There shall be eternal judgement. But not all of God's judgements are eternal. Some of His judgements only last during this present world. Others last ten generations. Others to the third or fourth generation. Others only for a lifetime. Some for less than a lifetime. And some can even be averted before they happen.

When God's judgements are in the earth, people learn righteousness.

Being filled with the Spirit includes being filled with judgement.

Paul told the Corinthians believers to set those who are least esteemed in the church as their judges.

One day the saints shall judge the world.

Many of us struggle with this concept of God, because we think it's Old Testament, we see Jesus operating differently.

But it's not just for the Old Covenant. Matthew 24 and the Book of Revelation are examples of judgement being spoken of in a New Covenant setting, by Jesus Himself.

God righteousness and His mercy are in tension with each other. God's grace has no meaning without God's Law. Redemption is needless if there is no judgement. Jesus is God's mercy in manifestation - but God's mercy exists against the backdrop of God's justice.

The Book of Romans says that civil officers are God's agents to enact His vengeance. That's a New Testament Scripture!

God still has His ways of dealing with nations. We can learn them.

Perhaps it's easier for us to think of it as reaping what you sow. God is not mocked - whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap. And if men do, then nations do - for nations are just groups of men. That's a New Testament concept.

In the New Testament, the remedy for judgement is different than it was under the Old Testament, and it's more effective - but the backdrop is still the same - God's justice, God's Law, God's judgement. "You reap what you sow" is both an Old and a New covenant principle. God still deals that way. Only the solution is different now. Once it was the Law - now it's to receive God's grace through faith.

God's judgements in the earth help us learn things. One of the roles of prophets is to receive revelation about history and to declare it and write it.

Let's have a look at a couple of Scriptures.

Remember the time when God promised Abraham, "I am the LORD that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it."

And Abraham replied, "Lord GOD, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?"

And God said to him, "Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years; And also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge: and afterward shall they come out with great substance."

So we see a principle here that God judged a nation because of the way they treated an ethnic minority within their land.

In this case, it wasn't a complete judgement against Egypt, to the point of another nation possessing their land. This was just a temporary judgement, in the form of pestilence and deaths, etc. This judgement was done directly by God. But God let them keep their land and their self-governance.

But sometimes instead of judging a nation directly, God also used another nation's military to enact a temporary judgement against another nation. The Book of Judges is full of examples of God sending foreign nations against Israel. These were only temporary judgements - often lasting around 40 years - because God later raised up deliverers.

Often these temporary judgments consisted of Israel being oppressed by a foreign regime, and often it seemed to be for approximately 40 years. So God sometimes allows temporary regime changes, through military actions. Sometimes divine-principle has allowed it.

But there was also a time when God saw fit to judge several nations more completely and permanently - to the point where another nation was commissioned by God to engage in military action and completely take over their country. For example:

God said to Abraham, "Thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full."

The LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, "Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates: he Kenites, and the Kenizzites, and the Kadmonites, And the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Rephaims, And the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites" (Genesis 15).

God promised all those lands to Abraham's seed. But his seed couldn't possess it yet for over 400 years. Why? Because the iniquity of one of those nations (the Amorites) was not yet full.

In other words, it wouldn't have been ethical yet for God to thoroughly judge the Amorites by handing their land permanently to another nation (to Abraham's seed) because their iniquity hadn't yet become so bad that such a permanent judgment was justified.

So we see a principle here that there came a point where God deemed it ethical to allow one country to be taken over permanently by another. When a country reached that point, due to its iniquity being full, God commissioned another country to possess their land, permanently.

And it doesn't mean the nation God is using is more righteous. Moses told Israel that it was not due to their righteousness that God was bringing them in to possess their lands, but due to the wickedness of those countries.

But God will also judge the nation He uses for its own wickedness, except they repent.

There are Scriptural precedents for all of this.

In the case of the Amorites - when the time came, He decreed His judgement against the Amorites by commissioning the Israeli military to fight against them. The military action was the enactment of a divine judgement. The military was acting as God's servants.

The Bible says in the Book of Psalms that the saints had that honour - the honour of executing God's judgements upon the nations.

So we see a principle, that military action is a service to God, and it enacts God's judgments.

And this didn't only apply when Israel was the actor. Remember when the Lord said to Ezekiel, "Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon caused his army to serve a great service against Tyrus: every head was made bald, and every shoulder was peeled..."

Notice God called it a "great service" that the king of Babylon had engaged in military action against Tyrus.

Then it goes on to say, "...yet had he no wages, nor his army, for Tyrus, for the service that he had served against it..."

It says that when one nation performs military action against another, at God's bidding, that nation deserves to be paid for it, like any employee deserves a reward.

Now notice what payment God decides to give him (to the leader of Babylon):

"Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I will give the land of Egypt unto Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon; and he shall take her multitude, and take her spoil, and take her prey; and it shall be the wages for his army. I have given him the land of Egypt for his labour wherewith he served against it, because they wrought for me, saith the Lord GOD."

God gave Babylon another land - the land of Egypt - as payment for having taken military action against another nation - the nation of Tyre. Obviously Egypt's iniquity must have reached the point that it was justified for them to now lose their land to another nation, as a judgement. Whereas when Moses was in Egypt, they were severely punished yet were allowed at that time to keep their autonomy.

So we see the principle here that God judged a nation by giving that nation's land to another nation as payment for services rendered to God by that other nation. Military action was considered a service to God (when such military action enacted a judgement which God had decreed - that is, when such military action was ethically mandated).

And notice something else: God allowed all this because He had decided it was time to allow another nation - a third nation - in this case the nation of Israel - a chance to strengthen, in the midst of all those goings-on:

"In that day will I cause the horn of the house of Israel to bud forth..."

So we see a principle here that when God wanted to cause one nation to strengthen, He did so by allowing other lands to be given to another nation - but only because all of this was ethically mandated - that is, because judgement or prosperity was called-for.

Now notice that God didn't always have to use a righteous nation to enact His judgments against another regime: He sometimes used the military of an unrighteous nation too. He even used a less righteous nation against a more righteous nation.

God used Babylon to judge and occupy other lands. But Babylon did not acknowledge that it had merely been a tool in God's hands - Babylon thought it had accomplished all these victories by itself. So because of their pride and cruelty and wrong motives - and because they were just as unrighteous (or perhaps even more unrighteous) than the nations they'd invaded - God decreed through the prophet that He would turn and also judge Babylon.

So we see these principles: that God enacted both temporary and permanent judgement against nations; that military invasion was a tool of God's judgement; that military engagement (when it was ethically mandated) was a service to God; that a nation who exercised such military action deserved a spin-off from it; that occupying another nation's land was sometimes allowed as a reward for ethically mandated military action; that God sometimes even used a less righteous nation to enact such judgments; and that the nation who exercises such military action would itself be on the receiving end of military judgement if its own motives and standards were not righteous.

It can all be summed up like this: "God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap." What applies to men, applies to nations. They reap what they sow.

But all in God's time. He has His times and purposes.

Sometimes He delays His judgements to give people space to repent.

Now let's have a look at whether all of this still applies in the New Testament:

ROMANS 13:1-7
1 Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God.
2 Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.
3 For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same:
4 For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil.
5 Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake.
6 For for this cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God's ministers, attending continually upon this very thing.
7 Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour.


That's New Testament!

So, sometimes intervention may be the compassionate thing to do, when it's ethically mandated.

But it's not the prerogative of individual civilians to take such matters into their own hand. It's the prerogative of God's appointed agents - governments, and their military.

A lady spoke at our church once who had been a missionary in Afghanistan. Kidnapped by the Taliban. Her testimony was that while she was held in prison by the Taliban, she and another imprisoned missionary were praying together, when she received a word of wisdom. It was revealed to her that God had allowed the Taliban to rule Afghanistan for a prescribed time as a judgement on Afghanistan for their having systematically burned down the last remaining churches, and she said it was revealed to her that the prescribed time of that particular judgement was up, and that God was calling her to intercede that the Taliban regime be removed seeing the time of Afghanistan's judgement was over. (It had been some 40 years). There in her prison, she felt led to perform a prophetic action in which she enacted God's missiles flying into the Taliban.

At the time, she had no knowledge that September 11 had happened. She had no knowledge that America was planning to invade Afghanistan - because in that prison she had no contact with the outside world. Next thing, America's missiles began landing, and soon she was freed by an American serviceman! She said God's purposes had been fulfilled.

All of what she said can be true, even if America's response to September 11 wasn't right. God can use everything to fulfil what He has decreed for the nations, even man's evil.

What man means for harm, God can turn for good.

It doesn't mean God always makes everything happen that's bad. But for reasons of moral principle, we can become subject to certain things that aren't good, by our behaviours. And sometimes by others' behaviours not our own. And God may allow it because of certain ethical principles too.

One such principle is that God is giving sinners space to repent. Another is that He has given us the world and waits for us to engage Him by our faith. Judgement is also one of His principles.

No comments:

Post a Comment