Great Video on a loving Community

There is a bond created when we serve together that goes deep. This is a great video that represents the depths of bonding and the impact it can have.

Creating Conditions for Success

Military success has a lot to do with creating the conditions for success. Conditions like larger force, better weapons, better trained people, terrain advantages. Jesus talks about setting conditions for success in discipleship. Jesus talks about setting the conditions of the heart that will result in success in discipleship. He compares it to a king who is analyzing the conditions for success in battle.

“Or what king, when he sets out to meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and consider whether he is strong enough with ten thousand men to encounter the one coming against him with twenty thousand?” Luke 14:31

He then states the discipleship condition that must be set in the heart of a person if he or she is to be a disciple of Jesus.

“So then, none of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions.” Luke 14:33

How someone views their possessions is critical to setting the conditions for success in discipleship. If you think that your possessions belong to you and you live to accumulate and protect those possessions for  your own interests, then you cannot be a disciple of Jesus. A military person knows what this looks like. Everyday they have resources at their fingertips that do not belong to them. Their weapons, equipment, people under them, and even their own lives belong to the military. They are stewards of it all. So to, we are all stewards of what rightly belongs to God. We are to give up ownership of our stuff and realize that God is the true owner of all our possessions. When this condition is set, then God can use our stuff for His glory, our benefit, and in service to others.

Would  you limit the impact of your possessions to what you can do with them, or would you give them to Christ and allow Him to use them for His impact? Will you use your stuff for your own temporal glory, or His eternal glory?

Father in heaven, I recognize that you own everything that I have and all that I am.

God and The Military

Just wrote this article for our valormovement.com website.

When was the Military Established?

The military is a God-ordained institution. God established the government as a provision and protection for the earth. Until the time of Noah, God had been the One who issued judgment against evil on the earth. When Cain killed Abel, God judged Cain and would not allow man to harm him. Genesis 4:15 says, “Then the LORD put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him.” 

When Noah stepped off the ark, God ordained a new method of administering justice… the government. In Genesis 9:6, God says, “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man.”  Man was to take the jobs of protection and punishment into his own hands. This is an awesome responsibility that requires those in leadership to do the right things.

God designed the government to administer His justice. The military is a government-designed institution that protects us from evil from outside our borders. The police protect us from evil from within our borders.

What is the Purpose of the Military?

The purpose of the military is to administer God’s justice. Romans 13:1-4 states,

“Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God. Therefore whoever resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God; and they who have opposed will receive condemnation upon themselves.  For rulers are not a cause of fear for good behavior, but for evil. Do you want to have no fear of authority? Do what is good and you will have praise from the same; for it is a minister of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil.”

God designed the government to administer His justice. The military is a government-designed institution that protects us from evil from outside our borders. The police protect us from evil from within our borders. They are a blessing to those who do good because they protect them. To those who do evil, however, they are to administer God’s justice and to cause them great fear.

If God has entrusted to man the right to bring evil to justice, how important is it for those who have that authority to walk with God?

What is the Responsibility of the Military?

When God gave mankind the right to govern themselves, He gave them a great responsibility. They were not to take this responsibility lightly, but they were to walk in the ways of God. When the kings of Israel took the throne, they were to learn and obey the laws of God and fear the Lord. Deuteronomy 17:18-19 states,

“Now it shall come about when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself a copy of this law on a scroll in the presence of the Levitical priests.  19 “It shall be with him and he shall read it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God, by carefully observing all the words of this law and these statutes.”

If those in power use that power for selfish gain, then great peril comes on us all. Military men and women need to be selfless servants who understand that they ultimately answer to God for how they administer justice. If they are to be God’s ministers of justice, they need to know God and His ways.

The reason we need the military is because of evil men. Psalm 82:5 states,

“They do not know nor do they understand;
    They walk about in darkness;
    All the foundations of the earth are shaken.”

If evil men are permitted to go unchecked and unpunished, they will destroy the earth in which we live. The need for the military is as follows:

•    Government stands between man and man’s complete destruction.
•    People can never be un-governed.
•    People need accountability.

The responsibilities of persons in the military are:

•    Know God’s Word.
•    Administer justice and grace in accordance with God’s Word.
•    Proper view of self and God-given authority.

The soldier is to be a minister of God who administers God’s justice. Therefore it is very important for our military men and women to walk with God. God established the government to provide us with good things and to protect us from evil people. The government (including military) can be a tremendous blessing to a nation or the greatest curse.

The Most Important Thing for Military Men and Women is to Walk with God.

Military men and women need to consider their calling from God to administer His justice. They are a blessing to all those who do good and a terror to the evildoers. That responsibility is rooted in a relationship with God in which they know Him and His ways.

How do one begin a relationship with God? Just as the military sets men and women free from evil, God has set us free from evil. Ephesians 2:1-10 states,

“And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.”

God took what was evil in us and dealt with it on the cross. Jesus took our sin on himself and rescued us from spiritual death. If we put our faith in Christ and His death on the cross to take care of our sins, then He will save us and give us an eternal relationship with Him.

The very nature of the purpose of the military is rooted in the nature of God. He desires to rescue us from evil, sin, and death. If we walk with Him and allow Him to teach us, He will show us how to do the same for others.

Road to Unafraid

I am reading The Road to Unafraid, by Jeff Struecker. Jeff was one of the Rangers portrayed in the movie, Black Hawk Down. He writes about dealing with his fears from childhood through his military career.  In one story, he writes about coming out of a terrible firefight in the streets of Mogadishu, losing one man and another seriously wounded.  When he arrives back at base, he vented to God saying, “God, like, so what’s the deal here? How come this all fell apart on me? What am I suppose to do next?”

If you are in the military, it is just a matter of time before you question God about what just happened. All of us have those moments in life. I believe it is a question that God wants us to answer. Do we really believe that He cares about us, that He knows what is going on, and that He has the power to do anything about it? If we ask the questions, and get answers, then we can act on these beliefs in future situations. God wants us to know that He does care, that He know us, and that He has the power to act.

In Mark 4, Jesus takes his small group of disciples across the sea at night in a terrible storm. He is sleeping while the disciples are frantically trying to keep the boat afloat. They wake Jesus and ask Him, ““Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?” Jesus answers this question, and the issue of His knowledge and power in His response and actions.

Does Jesus Care? – Where were they going on the boat? They were going to the other side to have an encounter with one man. He was a man who lived in a graveyard, possessed by 1000 demons. Jesus traveled at night in a storm to rescue one man, because He cares. He cares enough for one outcast to risk it all. He cares for you too. He not only wanted His disciples to know that He did care, but to ask them if they were willing to care enough for others to allow God to take them through storms to reach them. Jesus does care for you enough to die on a cross. Military men and women care enough for us to put their lives at risk to protect us. Will you allow Jesus to lead you through storms so that you may care for others?

Does Jesus Know? – Have you ever felt like you were going through a storm and Jesus was sleeping? Does He not realize the severity of the situation? Jesus knew about the demon-possessed man on the other side of the sea. Jesus knew what His disciples needed to learn about Himself. Jesus knows the storm you are in too. He also knows how He can use your storm to rescue others around you. If you knew about the pain of those around you, would you be willing to take some pain to heal their pain? Jesus knows, will you allow Him to use your life as healing ointment for others?

Does Jesus have Power? – Does Jesus have the power to do something about the situation? Well, He stood up and with just His words, He calmed the storm. He then went across the sea and cast 1000 demons out of the man and into pigs. He has the power to save our souls! God has the power to use your life to exercise His power. Will you trust Him to use His power in His wisdom?

The military takes care of people, gathers more intelligence, and has more power than any other earthly institution. Military men and women experience the responsibility that brings. The people of the nation come to trust the military will act on their behalf for the benefit of the world. Will you trust Jesus, who cares deeply, knows all, and is all-powerful, to act on your behalf for the benefit of the world?

Father, I trust you.

Where Love is Forged

William Manchester, who served as an enlisted Marine on Okinawa during the most intense fighting in the spring of 1945, wrote of his survival in his book Goodbye Darkness:

Today the ascent of Shugar Loaf [on Okinawa] takes a few minutes. In 1945 it took ten days and cost 7547 Marine casualties. And beneath my feet, where mud had been deeply veined with human blood, the healing mantle of turf [I murmured a prayer: God] take away this murdering hate and give us thine own eternal love. And then, in one of those great thundering jolts in which man’s real motives are revealed to him. I understood why I jumped hospital and, in violation of orders, returned to the front and almost certain death. It was an act of love. Those men on the line were my family, my home. They were closer to me than I can say, closer than any friends had been or ever would be. They had never let me down, and I couldn’t do it to them. I had to be with them, rather than let them die and me live in the knowledge that I might have saved them. Men, I now know, do not fight for flag or country, for the Marine Corps or glory or any other abstraction. They fight for one another.

Can you imagine a more deeper love than that which is forged in the mist of battle? A place where you experience giving your life for others and other giving their lives for you. It is a place where you hear a man’s last wishes as he lies dying. It is a place where you become the only person to connect a dying man to his family as you carry his last wishes to them.

When you experience that kind of connection and love, other things become pale in importance. That deep love causes you to loose interest in the material things of life and desire to live in that love.

John 13:34 says, “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.” The disciples experienced a love from Jesus that at the end of His life included washing their feet and dying on the cross for them. He tells them to love others, “As I have loved you.” The love they experienced transformed who they were so that everything changed. It caused them to have new priorities and new values and motives. They now lived to love others.

Jesus calls us to have that kind of love. We must remember the process to have that kind of love. We learn it and experience it from Jesus, then we can love others as He loved us. Where does this process take place? It takes place at the cross of Jesus. When we stand at the foot of the cross, we experience a place of death, where Jesus gave His life for us. We hear his last words, “Father, forgive them.” This place at the cross is also a place of our death. If us saying we will die to our own selves and ask Jesus to live through us.

“I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.” – Galatians 2:20

Father, thank you for your love for me shown through Jesus Christ. Let it transform my way of living.

Where Faith and Love Collide, Part 2

How is Faith and Love understood and expressed in the military? I believe that military persons have a deep experiential understanding of faith and love because of their military experiences. They have a deep understanding that they can apply to faith and love in Christ.

So, let’s take a look at Faith and Love in the military and see what we can learn.

Faith is believing someone has your best interest at heart. It believes that others have your back. This value is rooted in military training.  In the Army Leadership Field Manual, it states:

Soldiers fight for each other; they would rather die than let their buddies down. That loyalty runs front to rear as well as left to right: mutual support marks Army culture regardless of who you are, where you are, or what you are doing.  P. 43

The most important lesson/value I remember from my cadet days is that loving buddies was the most important thing. I was not to ever act on my own without thinking of them. I had 11 guys who had my back whether I was succeeding or failing. I developed a faith in them because I knew they loved me. That faith in them continues 20 years later. I experienced life, having faith in others who had my best interest at their hearts.

Think of all the phrases you live by that reflects a life of faith in the military. “Never leave a man behind”, “Accomplish the mission and take care of your men”, “Camaraderie”, and “Band of Brothers.” Think of what goes through your mind to comfort yourself in a firefight. My buddies have my back, my God will protect me, my weapons and armor will protect me. You exercise your faith in a deep way. You experience faith in life and death situations, and that deepens your faith.

Love is having another’s best interest at heart. That same military culture that teaches you to have faith, teaches you to take care of each other. You are constantly thinking of others. When you are in a firefight, what motivates you to act is a love for your buddies. You want to protect them. You joined the military to serve, to look out for and protect the interests of others. And you love them with your very life. You would die for them. That is a deep experiential love.

Integrating Military Life with Faith

The faith you experience in the military deepens your ability to have faith in God. If you have faith that your buddies have your back, that they are competent enough to look out for your interest on the battlefield, how much more can you have faith that God has your back? That He is competent and powerful enough to look out for your best interests.

The love for others you experience in the military deepens your ability to love everyone. If you can love and serve others in the military because of your training, just imagine how much you can love others when you allow God to train you how to love and serve.

Father in heaven, deepen my faith in you and teach me to more deeply love others.

Where Faith and Love Collide, Part 1

Recently, I thought about a statement in Galatians that said that maturity does not come through the law, but faith working through love. So I thought about the definitions of faith and love and was surprised by how simple and connected the Christian life is. It just makes sense. With the complexities of life, I seek simplicity so I can make sense of it all and focus my heart and mind. So, here are my thoughts that are in process, I hope they help you.

The bookends of the 7 Character Qualities are “Love God” and “Love others”, the Greatest Commandment. They go together. You cannot have one without the other. “And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also” (1 John 4:21).

The reason we are able to love others is because God first loved us. And we are able to love others because we have received God’s love, we understand it and experience it, and therefore we can share it with others. How do we receive God’s love? Through faith.

Paul says in Galatians that the law does not lead to spiritual maturity, but only faith working through love. Well, if that is the key, then it seems like we should know what faith and love are and how they work together. Here is a simple definition of each…

Faith – Believing someone has your best interest in mind.
Love – Having someone else’s best interest in mind.

I heard a friend of mine explain love as having someone else’s best interest in mind. He said he read it from Dallas Willard. I think this sums it up. If I love you, then I will think and act on your behalf, wanting the best for you. I love my wife and kids, so I live for their behalf. God loves me. He has my best interest at heart. Not “best interest” as I define it. You know how we define interests… money, success, and nice stuff. He has our best interested as he defines it. That we may know him and experience that relationship and grow into godly maturity.

Faith, by itself, is a pretty neutral word. To have faith in something. I can have faith that a chair will hold me when I sit in it. I act on it, but it is not really life changing. But when we apply faith to something significant, it changes our lives. What does it mean to have faith in God in its simplest form? It means to believe that God has our best interest at heart. There is a lot packed into that. First of all, it is God. He is all-knowing and all-powerful. So He not only has our best interest at heart, but he can do anything about it. Therefore, we know that all things happen for good, because he has our best interest at heart and He is controlling all things as He acts on that attitude toward us. The most powerful sentence in the human language is… God Loves Me.

In order to live a life loving others at every moment, we have to have faith. The biggest thing that keeps me from loving others is that I am trying to take care of myself. There is part of me that is not satisfied with who I am or what I have, so I am seeking my interest, not others. There is a disconnect between my faith in God and my loving others. If I truly live in the reality that God loves me, that He has my interest at His heart and He is acting on it, then I am free to love others. Nothing left for me to worry about for me, because God is acting on my behalf. Now I am free to act on other’s behalf.

Now, imagine a community of people who live in this reality. In this community, not only do I experience the fact that God has my best interest at heart, but others do also. I now experience the biggie, having faith in God, but I also experience having faith in people. I believe that people have my best interest at their hearts. And as I act on behalf of others, putting their best interest at my heart, how do you think they will feel?

Lord, help me live in the reality that You have my best interest at Your heart (FAITH) and help me have others best’s interests at my heart (LOVE).

Renuciation of Self as the Authority and Focus of One’s Own Life

The third character quality of a disciple is a renunciation of self as the authority and focus of one’s own life. This character trait is not taught in our civilian culture. The military, however, has it as one of its core values. “Selfless Service – Put the welfare of the nation, the Army, and subordinates before your own.”  Military life requires people to sacrifice themselves for another cause. In the Army Leadership Field Manual, it states, “For you as an Army leader, honor means putting Army values above self-interest, above career and comfort. For all soldiers, it means putting Army values above self-preservation as well.”  Soldiers are taught to operate in a culture where the organization is more important than one’s own life. There are not many organizations that require such sacrifice; therefore, soldiers experience to a greater degree than civilians the character trait of renouncing self as the authority and focus of one’s life.

At West Point, they teach this character quality by requiring cadets to put aside personal ambitions in order to fully devote themselves to the institution. Donnithorne puts it this way;

Followers’ jobs are at their essence to do as they are told. They are asked to surrender – for a time – their independence and devote themselves exclusively to practicing the values of the institution they have joined. Each person who comes to West Point learns where one’s individual authority ends and the institution’s begins.

Tom Neven believes strongly that a military person needs help from God in order to deny oneself, stating, “It’s a good thing God is involved in our training, because without his help in overcoming our lower nature we’d be hard pressed to develop the discipline and obedience necessary to succeed in the military.”

General Douglass MacArthur, addressing the cadets at West Point in May of 1962, commented on how the ability to sacrifice comes from our Maker.

The soldier, above all other men, is required to practice the greatest act of religious training – sacrifice. In battle, and, in the face of danger and death, he discloses those divine attributes, which his Maker gave when He created man in His own image. No physical courage and no greater strength can take the place of the divine help, which alone can sustain him.

To deny oneself is a key character quality in both discipleship and military life. Military training can help a disciple learn and experience what it means to renounce self as the focus and authority of one’s own life and being a disciple can help a military person increase their ability to deny themselves for the mission.

Father, allow us to deny ourselves as the authority and focus of our own lives so we can be fully devoted to your will and serve others as you have served us.

Disciple like a Soldier

The scriptures often use the military as a metaphor for the Christian life. Therefore, if you understand the military, you will better understand the principle being taught about the Christian life. That is the whole purpose of this blog: to help integrate faith and military life. In 2 Timothy 2:3-4, Paul tells Timothy to behave just as a soldier, “as a good soldier of Christ Jesus.” Paul gives the command to Timothy, then explains the metaphor of a soldier’ life.

Command:
Suffer hardship with me,
Metaphor:
as a good soldier of Christ Jesus.
No soldier in active service entangles himself in the affairs of everyday life,
so that he may please the one who enlisted him as a soldier.

A soldier knows hardship. Yet this hardship is not without companions. Paul calls Timothy to join him in the common sufferings that go with being a Christian of that day. If you think of Paul’s life (see 2 Cor. 11:23-28), you would hesitate to join him in his sufferings. Yet the cause by which he lived drew many to join him. A soldier joins others in the common sufferings of military life because of the cause. A soldier knows what Paul is talking about here. They do not take lightly the call to join in the everyday life of suffering as a soldier because they know what that means. Many people make commitments without fully understanding the implications. When they are in the middle of the suffering, they quit. A good soldier commits without the option of quitting.

Cadets, midshipmen, and military men and women know that they live a lifestyle that is different than the worlds. They are often misunderstood or avoided because civilians realize they live by a different system. A good soldier does not get entangled in the affairs of civilian life. The life of a disciple of Christ is also different than the life of the world. The purpose and goals are different; therefore the system of life in which they live is different. If a disciples’ purpose is to advance the kingdom of God, then they cannot live a life focused on advancing their own kingdom.

What motivates soldiers to suffer hardship and avoid things that will distract them from being good soldiers? They desire to please the one that enlisted them as a soldier. I still remember times when I was a cadet I would hear phrases like, “great job freshmen”, “you motivate me fish” (name from freshmen), and other phrases of motivation I cannot repeat here. I remember the day we got our “fish brass.” This was the day we were recognized as being pleasing in the sight of the upperclassmen for finally doing all things well as a cadet. That was the best day of my entire four years as a cadet. My eleven “fish buddies” and I suffered many hardships together to get to this point. We did not live the life of civilian students. We suffered together in order to please the upperclassmen and take care of each other.

When a cadet, midshipman, or soldier reads this passage, they not only have a mental understanding of what it means to suffer with others and avoiding the distractions of the world in order to please their commanders, but they have an experiential understanding that includes both their hearts and their hands.

How will you respond to this invitation from your heavenly commander who is enlisting you into His army? I imagine that if you know the love and power of the commander Jesus Christ, you will enlist and ask…

Father in heaven, “What is my mission?” and “Who are my fellow soldiers?”

Controlled By Love

Are there things in life so important that we are captivated by it? Not only are we captivated, but we find pleasure in serving it?

I am reading Becoming a Leader the Annapolis Way, by W. Brad Johnson and Gregory P. Harper. There is a chapter about commitment where the authors discuss how the Navy instills commitment into the character of midshipmen. They write, “Midshipmen harbor a sense of meaning and purpose about their work that most businesses seldom seem to conjure up from employees. Midshipmen understand that they are part of something important, something larger than themselves. This understanding allows them to make considerable sacrifice en route to becoming Navy and Marine Corps officers” (p. 41).

What causes a man or woman to undergo hardship, yet stay true to the mission? What causes a POW to be tortured everyday, yet remain loyal to country and fellow soldiers? What causes a cadet or midshipman to remain in the tough conditions of training during their college years? They are captured by a mission that is greater than themselves.

To be a disciple of Jesus requires commitment. We have seen that Jesus requires us to have a supreme and incomparable love and commitment to Him if we are to continue as disciples. Paul, in the book of 2 Corinthians, states that the love of Christ demonstrated to him has captivated him and controls him.

“For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.” – 2 Cor 5:14-15

This word “controls” has the idea of being pressed in on both sides so that we cannot move. The pressure on both sides controls us. Like a vice grip holds an object in place and controls it,  so Paul is pressed in on both sides by the love of Christ. He cannot help but be controlled by such a love.

How do we develop the character trait of commitment in our own lives? Get to know Christ more! The more we understand the love of Christ for us, the more it will control us. The more we understand the will of Christ for our lives, the more we will be committed to pleasing him.

“Suffer hardship with me, as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier in active service entangles himself in the affairs of everyday life, so that he may please the one who enlisted him as a soldier.” – 2 Timothy 2:3-4

Father, today I commit my heart, mind, and hands to you. You are my greatest desire.