Some folks don’t like military imagery applied to the church. They tried to remove “Onward Christian Soldiers” from the hymnbook. They overlook the countless references to armed conflict in the Hebrew Scriptures. They try to make the case that Jesus never talked about or endorsed warfare of any kind. Straining a gnats and swallowing camels, indeed.
The fact is, that is precisely the language Jesus used. At Caesarea-Philippi he asked his young disciples, “Who do you say that I am?”
Peter responded, “You are the Messiah, Son of the living God!” That was a military declaration in itself. In the mind of these young Hebrew men, enslaved all their lives by brutal Roman overlords, the anticipated Messiah would be a military leader who would rally the militia and lead them to defeat the Romans and remove them from the country so that David’s kingdom could be re-established.
Jesus seems to encourage these lifetime dreams with his response. “You are right, Simon, son of Jonah! The Holy Spirit revealed this to you. Upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it!”
The word church is a military term, but we miss it because we look at it with Western eyes. In Greek thought it referred to calling people together for debate and decision in a town council. But in Hebrew thought it means calling people together for war. Its Old Testament usage is indisputably military. This is why the young disciples heard mixed signals and could not understand why Jesus would go to Jerusalem to die when Messiah and warfare meant glorious victory. The reference to the gates of Hades to them meant the defences of Rome.
However, Jesus is using strong metaphor. He doesn’t mean for us to take up weapons and make disciples to Christianity by force. Far from it. Hades, hiding behind those strong fortresses, meant death and lifelessness and insignificance; decay and unproductivity and inaction. Hebrew life is active and vibrant, lived to the full with meaning and purpose. To go to Hades (Sheol, death) is abhorrent to the Hebrew mind.
Jesus uses Hades to describe the manner of life people get themselves into when they become enslaved by the devil. Self-defeating behaviors, habits, belief-systems, ways of living. Things like ignorance, grinding poverty, substance addictions, and chronic immorality. Dysfunctional family life and generations of living off the system. These are formidable strongholds holding people in bondage.
Jesus wants to gather a militant, well-armed, well-trained army of disciple-makers and send them to knock down these strongholds and set the captives therein free through relationship-based discipleship. We are to deliver them from the captivity of the death that ensnares them and introduce them to lives of meaning and purpose and accomplishment and contribution to others.
This should inform our disciple-making endeavors. Instead of trotting out another Bible study and trying to twist enough arms to get a respectable turnout, maybe we should look around at our community and identify the strongholds of Hades, and bring out weapons to tear down those walls and release those inside. If we listen closely enough, we’ll hear the captain of the Lord’s host dispatch us to take one of those strongholds, for the glory of the kingdom.
Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war . . .
The fact is, that is precisely the language Jesus used. At Caesarea-Philippi he asked his young disciples, “Who do you say that I am?”
Peter responded, “You are the Messiah, Son of the living God!” That was a military declaration in itself. In the mind of these young Hebrew men, enslaved all their lives by brutal Roman overlords, the anticipated Messiah would be a military leader who would rally the militia and lead them to defeat the Romans and remove them from the country so that David’s kingdom could be re-established.
Jesus seems to encourage these lifetime dreams with his response. “You are right, Simon, son of Jonah! The Holy Spirit revealed this to you. Upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it!”
The word church is a military term, but we miss it because we look at it with Western eyes. In Greek thought it referred to calling people together for debate and decision in a town council. But in Hebrew thought it means calling people together for war. Its Old Testament usage is indisputably military. This is why the young disciples heard mixed signals and could not understand why Jesus would go to Jerusalem to die when Messiah and warfare meant glorious victory. The reference to the gates of Hades to them meant the defences of Rome.
However, Jesus is using strong metaphor. He doesn’t mean for us to take up weapons and make disciples to Christianity by force. Far from it. Hades, hiding behind those strong fortresses, meant death and lifelessness and insignificance; decay and unproductivity and inaction. Hebrew life is active and vibrant, lived to the full with meaning and purpose. To go to Hades (Sheol, death) is abhorrent to the Hebrew mind.
Jesus uses Hades to describe the manner of life people get themselves into when they become enslaved by the devil. Self-defeating behaviors, habits, belief-systems, ways of living. Things like ignorance, grinding poverty, substance addictions, and chronic immorality. Dysfunctional family life and generations of living off the system. These are formidable strongholds holding people in bondage.
Jesus wants to gather a militant, well-armed, well-trained army of disciple-makers and send them to knock down these strongholds and set the captives therein free through relationship-based discipleship. We are to deliver them from the captivity of the death that ensnares them and introduce them to lives of meaning and purpose and accomplishment and contribution to others.
This should inform our disciple-making endeavors. Instead of trotting out another Bible study and trying to twist enough arms to get a respectable turnout, maybe we should look around at our community and identify the strongholds of Hades, and bring out weapons to tear down those walls and release those inside. If we listen closely enough, we’ll hear the captain of the Lord’s host dispatch us to take one of those strongholds, for the glory of the kingdom.
Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war . . .
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