Interview 54 Beating Guns (Shane Claiborne and Mike Martin)

Last Saturday while I was attending a Christian festival in Ohio, a 21 year-old man entered a Walmart in El Paso, TX and murdered 22 people, injuring 24 more, making it the 7th deadliest shooting in modern US history.  What’s so crazy about this, is that walking into a huge store like Walmart and shooting a semi-automatic assault rifle and hitting 46 people is only 7th!  Can you agree with me that we have a gun-violence problem in America?

Then, the next day, a 24 year-old man shot 10 people outside a bar in Dayton, Ohio, injuring 27 more. He used another semi-automatic assault rifle.  What is the Christian response to all of this?

Well, today we are going to hear from two Christians who think it’s time for Christ-followers to lead the way in enacting and living out the prophecies of Isaiah and Micah to beat our swords into plowshares and our spears into pruning hooks (and our guns into mattocks.)  In fact, they’re already doing just that.

I went to see Shane Claiborne and Mike Martin on their “Beating Guns” tour when they came to New Haven, CT (the same town as Yale University).  I stood there outside the church watching as a woman whose life was traumatized by gun violence beat on a glowing hunk of metal, that had once been a gun, confiscated by the police and now being transformed into an actual garden tool.  As she brought the hammer down on the softened metal, she began weeping.  As she continued hitting it harder and faster she started wailing.  I stood there watching as she took out her overwhelming pain and personal loss on that piece of metal. It was cathartic, prophetic, and transformative.

Now I realize that gun-violence is a hot-button issue in our culture today and that many of you listening to this own guns for a variety of purposes.  I don’t expect you to just change what you believe about guns after a single podcast episode, but I simply ask that you listen to these guys as they talk about this subject from a Christian perspective.

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15 thoughts on “Interview 54 Beating Guns (Shane Claiborne and Mike Martin)

  • I gave them a listen, but I feel this was a very mis-leading interview overall by the authors. Maybe the book reveals more, but I doubt it.

    They have a few good points and some good things to address about investing in our local communities(of which I hope they’re also doing and not just spreading their message everywhere). I agree with that comment TONS! I think we’d all be better off turning off the phones, social media and TV’s for a few months and then just interacting with our own actual neighbors for those few months. But Shane’s false comparison(cross vs. gun), the mis-use of the word “assault rifle”(undefined, but assuming they refer to an AR-15 style rifle) to act like it’s a major plight on Americans when it’s statistically insignificant threat to your life, and their gun stats are misleading. Most of the deaths are due to suicide or gang-related violence… and of all websites, even Vox is being more up-front with some of these stats lately. Even I’m surprised.

    https://www.vox.com/2015/10/1/18000524/mass-shootings-rare

    Basically, your personal eating habits and living habits are a larger threat to your life than any gun in America and then maybe car deaths from accidents soon after that–it’s simply fear and emotions that drive these types of things. We just accept the reality of the risk of owning/driving cars at 70MPH down the highway yet many don’t wish to accept that same reality with guns, especially in the media(and social media). And it is perfectly understandable, yet not perfectly logical. I’m not going to convince a mom who lost her child to a crazy person with rifle that shot up a school with the stats. I doubt I would be convinced either in her position.

    I really think their retort to “It’s a heart problem, not a gun problem” is just a contradiction. If mostly professing Christians of any general form that try to follow “Love your neighbor as yourself” own most of the U.S.’s guns, then the people whom are actually harming people with guns en masse or by homicide are not Christians…. so they do have a heart problem, while the Christians do(should) not.

    The “pro-life” but supporting death penalty/gun self-defense is another misunderstanding… I don’t know for sure if that’s intentional. Pro-life is for the innocent and weak, not for the murderers and those who break the law. So just as trying to stop an innocent child in the womb from being slaughtered is pro-life…. so is stopping a rapist/murderer in the act. Pro-life defends the innocent, not the guilty against God’s moral law. This entire argument is just a denial of the OT too… which leads to the next problem.

    “We are red-letter Christians”—that’s just a joke. I’m not trying to be mean in saying that—it’s just not something I could take seriously… that’s like a willing Gnostic “cut up the Scriptures, ignore what I don’t like” position that’s completely ahistorical. I know you’re there to interview them and not to pressure them–but that’s something I would have laughed at in person. When Jesus was walking, talking and teaching in Israel—there was no NT. It was mostly the OT and oral teachings in circulation. When Paul taught and wrote his letters–there was no NT, Paul said the “Scriptures were inspired for teaching, correction, rebuke” and by that he meant the OT. That comment they said it basically to ignore all the OT and a few portions of the NT. There’s no reasoning with that type of position if they don’t accept what is agreed to as “Scripture” including both the OT and NT.

    There’s tons more that’s already been fleshed out I believe by me and many others regarding the “contradictions” of Jesus to the OT Torah–so I’m not doing it here again.

    Overall I expected a bit more for the two men to have researched a bit more having written a book, but I was disappointed. No one has to own guns, no one’s forcing someone to own guns–but no, the Constitution’s second amendment doesn’t only apply to “single shot” musket guns. The amendment says “arms.” A simple reading of influential writers at the time of it’s drafting show they meant new technology with guns also and many types of “multi-shot” guns existed at the time up to the 2nd amendment’s drafting. As someone said on a comment I saw “If the 2nd only applies to muskets, then ‘freedom of the press’ only applies to the printing press.”

    I own guns, I hunt and I carry. I hope I never have to use it against any person, but I’ve accepted the reality in carrying that I may have to one day. If a person cannot accept that reality, then they shouldn’t carry.

    • So I take it based on your closing statement that you believe it is okay as a Christian to kill someone? Since we are instructed to follow the example of Jesus, is it your understanding that under certain circumstances Jesus would have killed someone? Where do you get such an understanding from? The closest I have heard as a justification is Luke 22:36-38, and even that is highly questionable given the context both during and afterwards as well as in conjunction with Matthew 26:52. If you want to own guns in order to hunt, that’s fine. But to claim to be someone who follows after Jesus and then claim to be willing to use a gun against another human being… that I find incongruous.

      • Thanks for the reply Andrew.

        I believe it is fine because I take a differing presupposition upon the Bible with a (hopefully) more historical perspective. It doesn’t mean I’m without blind spots—but that means that the OT is not to be negated in our understanding or teaching of Jesus or the NT. I don’t believe like many do that Jesus was *contradicting* the OT Torah with his teachings. I understand the difficulty in possibly reading that–but many without the foundation of the OT first(like a faithful Jew of Jesus’ time) growing up on the Torah would have rejected Jesus if he taught AGAINST it at all. I mean, even the Law itself says not to add/take away from it, and Jesus affirmed not one jot/tittle shall pass in his sermon on the mount. Even before the Torah there was law that God said very early on “Whoever sheds mans blood, by *man* his blood shall be shed; for God made man in His image”(Gen 9:6). God is not against the death penalty even prior to His Torah to His people. Then also we have Torah commands judging the breaking into a home and bloodshed allowance(Exodus 22:2-4). The texts regarding rape in the Torah also assume someone would come to aid if a woman is screaming for help(Deut 22:23-27). Many of these situations would require some sort of violence, albeit not necessarily deadly.

        As for Luke 22 I think the context is assuming Peter’s earlier misunderstanding of Jesus’ coming death–and Jesus knowing that fighting was not only against God’s will for Jesus, but stupid against the odds of the Romans and asking to die. This is also akin to Matt 26:52. To use these verses one way or the other to support or ban all self-defense is to stretch it well beyond it’s historical context. Also, notice that the text assumes that at least 2 swords were already being carried by a couple apostles. Wouldn’t Jesus have already been against this? It’s not like a sword is invisible or as easily hidden as a pistol.

        I don’t find it incongruous to defend the innocent parties if they can be determined in an altercation. The Bible as a whole supports this view wholeheartedly from my understanding. And to be clear–I used to be a an extreme pacifist in the past mainly focusing on the NT words of Jesus and the apostles. I held the same position(or possibly more extreme) as the men in this podcast. It was further study of contrary opinions that led me to back off and take a more middle ground of always seeking peace yet being ready to defend if I had to for a legitimate reason. When it comes to war an larger scenarios–I admit this position gets very untenable. I have no answer for going to war against other professing Christians in the military of their local nation other than to try to avoid it. There’s just so many variables that are unknown or could lead to doing something like Sean Finnegan has said would lead to Christians attacking Christians.

        • Thank you for such a thoughtful post. I respect where you are coming from and it is interesting that you moved away from pacifism through further study. While I do agree that Jesus held himself to Old Testament Law, it seems to me that Jesus taught those who followed him to go beyond the letter of the Law and to instead follow the Spirit of the Law. For Paul tells us that the Law kills but the Spirit gives life.

          Following the letter of the law only leads to death, but following the Spirit of the law (loving our neighbors as ourselves) through Jesus and the Spirit, leads to life. It is for this reason that I would argue that killing and violence, while allowed in some instances based on the letter of the law (OT), is clearly not in keeping with the Spirit of the Law which would have us love our neighbor as ourselves. Now perhaps you could come up with a situation in which killing or physically harming someone is a loving action, but I personally can not see it and would not follow that course of action.

          Furthermore, the letter of the Law made allowance because man cannot follow the Spirit of the law without the indwelling of the Spirit. This is why Jesus tells the teachers of the law that Moses granted divorce because of the hardness of men’s hearts, but it is not so based on the Spirit of the Law. The same could be said for OT law directing the Jews to kill those who committed certain types of sin. From the OT perspective, killing these individuals was to keep Israel pure until the arrival of Jesus. But now that Jesus has arrived and the Kingdom is being preached, violent force has no place for the Christian as it did for the Jew. This is just my understanding of scripture though. I assume you disagree.

          I do agree with you that fighting in wars on behalf of one’s country is very problematic since you essentially would be forced to act in violence under certain situations. Better to conscientiously object and suffer the consequences than to take up arms and potentially kill your brothers and sisters in Christ.

          • “Love you neighbor as yourself” is found in Leviticus 19, and is the heart of the Law.

            Neither Jesus nor YHWH ever forbade killing. I think we seriously misunderstand Jesus when we think of him as a pacifist. When we next see him, he will be riding a white horse, armed with a sword, ready to slay evildoers [Rev 19]. Jesus and his father love the death penalty, not because they love violence, but because they love justice and life. Check out Numbers 35:30-34. These aren’t words from Moses, they are words from YHWH. He wants to punish evil so that the good may be protected.

            If these words do not fit into our image of YHWH or Jesus, we should change our image of them.

            As long as there evil people who do violence against the innocent, the weak, the righteous, then justice will require violence, ideally in public (colonial America did this). And the would-be evildoer “will hear and fear” and consider that crime is not worth the risk.

            It isn’t that killing and violence was “allowed in some instances,” it was specifically commanded by YHWH many times. The Exodus was violent. The conquering of Caanan was violent. Jesus’ return will be violent. We must have a robust enough understanding of our God and his heart that we can easily reconcile these ideas with his love. For me, love something requires hating its opposite. Loving good requires hating evil. Protecting good requires action against evil. Honoring good requires punishment of evil.

          • Luke,

            I can’t find a button to reply to your comment so I will just reply to myself but address your points.

            “Love your neighbor as yourself” is found in the OT, which is why we are told it is both an old commandment and yet also a new commandment in 1 John 2. It is new in the sense that is was given new meaning by Jesus during his ministry and afterwards by the apostles. The new commandment speaks of a radical love that goes beyond what was understood before. It is a love that comes through the power and indwelling of the Spirit within the sons of God. In fact, Paul teaches us that by loving others who do evil to us, we heap burning coals on them and make their judgement before God all the more severe. Yet we also hope that our love will turn their hearts away from evil and towards God. We are not called to repay evil with evil, but to repay evil with good. There is a time for repaying evil, but it is not in the current age.

            In your zeal for justice, you are forgetting that there is a time already set aside for justice and that is the time of judgment at the end of the age. At the time of the Resurrection, all will be judged and justice will be appropriately administered by the judge of all the earth through those he has appointed who have demonstrated that they are worthy to judge. You focus on justice done on in this age by those who are unworthy to judge appropriately, yet you seem to discount the justice that is awaiting those who are wicked and evil at the Resurrection.

  • Guns are not the problem. You have people stabbing people. We all own knifes, does that mean that i have ever stabbed someone?. You have people driving into other people on purpose in vans. Does it mean that we should not own vans.
    There is nothing wrong with owning a gun if your intentions are not sinister.Even as a christian.
    I do not own a gun but living here in South Africa, where the crime rate is high,where i myself know of family members, friends and collegues who have lost someone to violence and crime and in some cases if these people did not own a weapon, they would not have been able to defend themselves and their families.
    Yes as a christian we should have faith that God will protect us, but in a corrupt and violent society in which we live in today i will never condemn a responsiable person, being christian or not for owning a gun for self protection.

  • This was an interesting podcast to listen to and I was certainly impressed by the sincerity of Shane and Mike who were interviewed by Sean Finnegan. Nevertheless, though recognizing some common ground, I would agree with almost all of the other Sean’s well stated comments of disagreement above – both about guns and the necessity of understanding the Bible comprehensively on any subject, especially in understanding the NT in light of its OT background and continuing relevance.

    As for whether or not it is morally right for a Christian to own a gun for protection purposes or to actually use it resulting in the intentional death of another person in a just cause, Jesus himself, never directly addresses any of these questions about guns or other arms. Thus, to take the position that he intentionally overturned the clear law enforcement provisions of the OT Law and Prophets (e.g. Ex. 20-24; Lev.18-20; etc.) in the Sermon on the Mount when he stated, “But I say to you, do not resist an evil person…” etc., is highly dubious given that he just said that he had not come to abolish the Law and the Prophets and given his actions and statements throughout rest of the Gospels. Most importantly, however, it goes against the whole tenor of scripture in the OT and NT where the primary godly function of government is to protect society, especially the weak and vulnerable (e.g. Psalm 82). Most NT scholars believe that Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount is not overthrowing the just laws of the OT but rather correcting misinterpretations and misapplications of the Mosaic Law common at the time, or else, transcending them by returning to God’s original intentions in creation. Rather than using “interpretive tricks” most of these scholars or students of the Bible are simply trying to understand how all verses on a particular subject work together – one of the most basic principles of biblical interpretation. It is not wise to opt for the easy position of taking such an important statement simply “at face value” when against the background of other scriptures it seems to be extreme on its own. Every biblical statement has a background and context. Indeed, there is no reason to think that Christ’s statement “do not resist an evil person” is any more of an “absolute” than his statement, “Judge not that you be not judged”. In fact, both of these, as well as most other statements in the Sermon on the Mount, are qualified by other NT biblical statements (e.g. Rom. 13; I Cor. 5:9-13) and it is highly unlikely that any Jewish person who heard Christ’s statements at the time would have taken them to be absolutes since the very principles he states are already in the OT itself where they are also qualified by other principles including the just use of violence to the point of death (e.g. Lev. 19-20).

    Finally, given that we know beyond a shadow of doubt that even in the new covenant era Paul and Peter clearly believed in and promoted the just use of force even to the point of death by government officials (e.g. Rom. 13; I Peter 2; Acts 25:11, 1 Tim. 1:8-11) how can we possibly say that a Christian cannot ethically participate in this as a government official or even as a non-governmental individual who is acting in legitimate defense of self or others according to law? These laws in regards to the just use of force are not bad laws, but godly laws according to Romans 13, I Tim. 1:9ff, etc. Indeed, Christians are even commanded to pay taxes to support those who are in these governmental positions because they are doing the just and godly work of God himself for the protection of society as a whole. “But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger, who carries out the wrath of God on the wrongdoer” (Rom. 13:4). So, as in the OT (Lev. 19:17-18), so in the NT, individuals are not to take personal vengeance (Matt. 5:38-39; Rom. 12:17, etc.) but rather to rely on “God’s vengeance” being carried out by the just avenging power of government (Rom. 13:4). So, yes, I believe that Christians as well others can legitimately use guns (or other arms) for protection of society either as governmental officials or in legitimate defense of self or others, To think otherwise would, in my view, be the height of hypocrisy – i.e., either ignoring our governmental responsibilities or else the paying of others via taxes, etc. to do our dirty work for us.

    So let me turn the questions around. Do you Shane, Mike and Sean actually believe that you are not to protect – even by force to the point of death if necessary – your wife, your children your neighbors if they are attacked by others who are trying to do them grave harm including death? How can that possibly be in accordance with the will of the same God who commands husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it? How can it possibly be in accordance with the God who commands love for one’s children and love for one’s neighbor? In addition, is it wrong to kill in defense an attacking person (s) to save another innocent person(s). Is “love your enemies” an absolute? Does one not defend against an enemy who wants to kill one’s neighbors(s). How is that loving your neighbor? Life, of course, doesn’t fit so neatly into a box. That was true even in OT times and exceptions and qualification were made to rules and laws even then. So, is “do not resist an evil person” really an absolute or is it also meant to be interpreted and understand in the light of other qualifying principles as it clearly is, for example, in Lev. 19-20 in the OT and Rom. 12 -13 in the NT? I’m interested to hear your answers.

    For those interested in a fairly brief but extremely well done presentation of the point of view I present above I recommend articles on these subjects in The ESV Study Bible pp. 2550 – 2555 as well as the study notes on the Sermon on the Mount and on Rom. 13. I will close by quoting from the study notes of Matt. 5:39:

    “Jesus is not prohibiting the use of force by governments, police or soldiers when combating evil (see notes on Luke 3:12-14; Rom. 13:1-4; 1 Peter 2:13-14). Rather, Jesus’ focus here is on individual conduct, as indicated by the contrast with Matt. 5:38, which shows that he is prohibiting the universal tendency to seek personal revenge.”

    Finally, as someone who has taught history for decades and has also been involved in starting and building fellowships in many places in the world I can only say, may God give us all the honest Christian government officials, law enforcement officers, and soldiers that he can provide. There are fewer greater needs; not only in America, but most especially in the rest of the world!

    • As I mentioned in my reply to Sean, the paradigm has certainly changed with regards to the role of a follower of Jesus in comparison to a follower of the Law given through Moses. The purpose of following the Law given through Moses was so that the Israelites would proposer in the in land God had given them. But Paul is very clear, the Law was never meant to save, but merely to expose sinfulness.

      The follower of Jesus follows the Law of Jesus, which is actually an old commandment. Love your neighbor as yourself. Doing this you fulfill the Law and the Prophets by following the spiritual law that the Mosaic Law was founded upon. But as I mentioned in my previous post, Jesus himself points out that concession were placed within the Mosaic Law because of the hardness of men’s hearts. Because of those concessions, the Mosaic Law actually fell short of the true spiritual law of God encapsulated in the commandment “love your neighbor as yourself.”

      You point out situations in which not acting to save someone might constitute an act of not loving your neighbor, but if you kill someone or use violent force then you are definitely not acting loving towards them. If we look at 1 Corinthians 13 to find out what love is, it becomes very hard to argue that killing or harming someone is a loving action, even if they seek to harm us or someone we care about. I imagine that someone who is trying to kill or harm us is our enemy. How does Jesus tell us to respond to our enemies? Luke 6:32-36 gives us a good image of this.

      Remember, as a follower of Jesus, our citizenship is in the Kingdom of Heaven. We are only sojourners in this life. God has granted governments authority to maintain stability for the sake of those who are of this world, but since we are not of this world, we do not necessarily need such protect since we have the assurance of God and the promise of a Resurrection into life. We should submit to our governments, but I don’t think we should support the violence that they carry out by taking part in it ourselves. Those who fear death need protection from it, but those who love God need not fear those who can only destroy the body. This is why Jesus and the apostles did not fight against their oppressors, but either fled or went meekly to their deaths.

      Obviously we are free to join in with those of this world who kill and harm others (almost everyone believes they are justified when they do so). Perhaps we can even point to the Old Testament Law or Paul’s admonishment to respect the government to justify our actions. I worry that many will be in for a shock though when it is all said and done. Right now we live in a time of safety when there really is no need to test our radical love for our enemies. But a time might come when there will be a testing. I believe at that time, the followers of Jesus will be identified by their loving response to the enemies that seek their life. Romans 8:35-36 “For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered”

  • I think that Shane, Mike, and Sean are seriously misunderstanding the Sermon on the mount.

    Jesus phrase “you have heard it said… but I tell you…” is NOT casting any negative light on the Law of YHWH (his daddy’s words), but lifting it out of the muck and revealing its beauty. For instance, we have heard “Do not commit adultery” but Jesus tells us not even to lust in our hearts. That is clearly raising the standard, honoring the purpose and the intention of the Lawgiver. Likewise, when he brings up “An Eye for an Eye” he isn’t throwing it out. He is raising it out of the mire. The context is if we, the audience, have done wrong and are being punished, accept the punishment plus some, in order to show contrite submission to justice (“if he sues you for your tunic, give him your cloak as well”). If I have accidentally wounded someone’s eye, I should willingly endure whatever justice is due, and offer to receive more. Notice Jesus did not offer his other cheek when he was struck during his trial! Also, when we see Jesus next, he will have a sword in his hand to slay his enemies. We need to adjust our understanding of him if we think Jesus is a non-violent pacifist who wishes we got rid of the death penalty.

    Jesus had just said in Matt 5:17-19, a few thoughts before the Lex Talionis commentary, that “I have not come to abolish the Law… not one jot or tittle would pass from the Law until all is accomplished… whoever does even the least of these commands and teaches others to do so will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” It makes no sense that Jesus would open his sermon with these words and then proceed to remove a few jots and tittles from the law! Jesus and his disciples did not change the definition of righteousness.

    God’s law is “holy, righteous and good” [Paul, Rom 7:12] and James calls it the “perfect Law of Freedom.” God, and his appointed judge Jesus, punishes evil. He gave nations the sword in order to address murder with justice. He commands directly the death penalty several times (Numbers 35) and says that we defile his land if we let the murderer go free. Why? Because YHWH loves life, and those who attack what YHWH loves need to be stopped.

    YHWH is life, gives life, loves life, and evil is the opposite. Evil hates life and attacks life. In response, good men, good governments, and our good God should pose a great danger to evil. If more good men were dangerous, fewer evil men would act. If evil men knew the government was more dangerous, fewer evil men would act. But instead they get appeals and life in prison, where the victim taxpayer provides for their room and board.

  • This is a reply to Sean from his response on the next podcast near the end:

    I’m leaving it here so it doesn’t change or take over the subject of your newer podcast(s). It may seem long but having to write out and quote/link my claims to your 10 minute or so response takes a bit. That’s why I may seem thorough in trying to answer what I’m able to answer. I don’t want to be misunderstood or unclear if possible in my writing.

    I don’t believe that one shouldn’t be concerned with shootings, but rather to aim those concerns at the proper answer and a solution that doesn’t blame or attempt to restrict lawful gun owners. We ALL agree on the horror of a mass shooter(or any murderer)—the difference is how we’d handle the problem. Guns have been owned for hundreds of years in this country–and mass shootings beyond war have only recently become a more prevalent problem in our last couple generations. Guns have existed for hundreds of years, mass shootings haven’t. So the correlation is highly pointing away from guns being the actual problem to be dealth with.

    “Everyone has a fighting chance” Knives are silent killers… and a knowledgeable person can kill multiple people in less than a minute by hitting an artery. Your heart will literally pump your blood right out of your body if you don’t get a tourniquet on it immediately. It happens more often than you might think—you just don’t hear about it as often because it’s not what the media focuses on when it’s not their agenda. Here’s the most recent one I found from late May 2019.
    https://www.npr.org/2019/05/28/727426277/2-killed-at-least-16-others-injured-in-japan-mass-stabbing

    “People do not have a chance to survive”—really depends on the context. And if they carried, it would be a much better chance than not carrying(though nothing is a guarantee). I’ve actually been held at gunpoint while holding your same theological position on this subject years ago. Only found out later the criminal had a realistic looking pellet gun. I didn’t attempt to fight him, but later I will admit I highly thought about it as he wasn’t large and my co-worker was a rather large guy. I wasn’t being held at gunpoint for my faith, but for money. Might I humbly suggest taking an evening and binge watching some videos from “Active Self Protection” on Youtube. It’s not easy to watch many of them–and you’ll see both the good and the bad of guns, knives or another type of attack from the innocent and guilty parties in altercations. Sometimes there’s no innocent parties.
    https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsE_m2z1NrvF2ImeNWh84mw
    The gun problem has a main source in my opinion(not fact)–and it’s media glorification and parental issues. The media knows how to gaslight the public with their polarization in politics and social issues, then social media churns them even more. There’s also studies that have shown that showed many of the mass shooters had no good male figure(dad) in the house. Hence, gangs too as you agreed about them being a problem.
    https://www.realclearpolitics.com/2018/02/27/of_27_deadliest_mass_shooters_26_of_them_were_fatherless_435596.html

    Guns and knives are not the same, agreed–but the context really depends on the effect of each. I feel like I’m mainly talking with someone who’s not been around guns much, am I right? I don’t remember you commenting on it even though one of the guests did say they grew up around them.
    Bolt-action guns can be fired as quickly as a semi-auto. I’m assuming you want to ban magazines or larger 30 round magazines? Banning semi-autos would ban the majority of guns, and a revolver with a speed loader can be learned to fire quickly if one trains.

    Bolt Action gunfire – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_a7pXWi6xo

    As for new covenant theology—like said before we have many differences. In the sermon on the mount you quoted “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.” The OT Torah says nothing like this, this is a false teaching of the religious leaders that Jesus is addressing from my understanding. If Jesus was quoting the Torah directly, he’d have said “It is written…”. God has always loved his enemies, but this “love” is very generalized as one can even see in the context. God sends the rain on the just and unjust and the sun shines on both the just and unjust. This is clearly not contradictory to God calling for the death penalty for murderers.
    Long ago I could not answer the “how is it loving for you to kill your enemy?” question too. It’s the same question I eventually posed to everyone I ran into that was contrary to my former pacifist position. The problem is this is acontextual to teaching and historical context. God loves his enemies, as clearly demonstrated–yet will kill them at times. I think this is without any needed reference as there’s too many examples to name. And this same “love” is what makes us akin to God, so the “God can do this, we can’t” claim would negate one being like Him here. Again, this is an OT teaching too—Psalm 145:8-10. So it happened long before Jesus.
    There may be a 3rd option–I used to claim this too, but this wasn’t always the norm as clealry seen in the Bible unless it was explained beforehand. Abraham was not a part of the covenant of Mount Sinai, yet when his nephew lot was captured–Abraham went after him and killed his captors to save him. Most of the times in the Bible self-responsibility is the assumed position unless clearly told otherwise(such as in a prophecy).
    “Never take vengeance”… this will be a disagreement on the meaning of “vengeance” and “self-defense” and our understanding of the judgment of 70AD. I believe they’re not to be equated–as one is after the bad event has occurred and going back to “avenge” someone while self-defense is in the act itself.
    “Vengeance is YHWH’s, I will repay” is relevant to the coming judgment upon Jerusalem as prophesied in Deut 32:35… the context clearly is about God judging Israel and saving the righteous in His land. This is something I don’t believe applies in the same way you may think because I believe it already occurred– even while it does apply in principle. I don’t take vengeance on anyone, nor would I advocate it. Justice should take its proper route if a wicked act has occurred. The same thing with “evil for evil,” it’s not evil to defend the innocent. These are commands throughout the OT(Proverbs 20:22). We end up both cherry picking and thus creating contradictions if principles from the OT are not taken first from my understanding to coincide with many of the same teachings of Jesus and the apostles. I just differ on what is different in the new covenant.

    I’ll have to look at the debate on “Just War”–but up front I would admit since I used to align very closely, if not exactly with the anabaptist position on the sermon the mount I doubt I’ll hear more than what I’ve already read/said/heard before. I admit the position becomes untenable with war. There’s just too many variables and unknowns to uphold what my government leader says about who my “enemy” is…. I think that’s partially why in the OT one was allowed to not take place in war if they weren’t fully committed for a legitimate reason(Deuteronomy 20:1-9). Sadly our modern army calls you a coward and can charge you for not being willing to fight. I know about the ANF beliefs on this subject and also have read all of Bercot’s books. My position didn’t change until some time in later 2016 and I’m not sure if I was interacting with you much back then. I wasn’t even aware of this podcast until I was interviewed I think. I don’t tend to go back in many podcasts unless I have nothing newer to listen to, so no it has nothing to do with guns.

    Oh and there’s no hard feelings in any sense. I love having this discussion and interacting on it. I am not trying to force anyone to use guns or weapons of any kind. I just don’t want someone trying to actively steal my property or many others who abide within the law, which are guns in this case. I also don’t believe someone has to do violence. I just believe it’s allowable.

    • Just for clarification of a link you posted stating that 26 of the 27 deadliest mass shooters were fatherless, it turns out that the person making the claim didn’t provide a source and was likely wrong in their assertion.

      https://wilcfry.com/blogs/verily/archives/2644?fbclid=IwAR2xMxi9mMTtAH57Jg_r0n85Fao_kMVwFFcc2ELSfOcNNUnBZf4pwSX2K4E

      It’s a minor point and I do agree with your overall point that banning guns is not the appropriate way of dealing with mass shootings. With that said, I don’t see an issue with tightening regulations regarding who can purchase guns, but I see your point that restricting certain types of guns won’t necessarily help if someone is committed to killing lots of people.

      I’m still very curious about your shift from pacifism to your current stance. Perhaps I just can’t see it from your perspective because I have not investigated it enough. Certainly on a personal level I see no need to abandon pacifism, but if I can understand why violence is appropriate for a Christian, perhaps I would not argue that it should be a policy Christians should adopt.

      • Thanks for the reply Andrew.

        I looked through that link and also at the counter-assertions by a respondent. I still think it looks like many of these shooters are being tied to home issues of some sort—but the constantly updated source from the CNN article has not been currently researched. I have no clue about the original claim at this point and Snopes said it couldn’t be fully researched or was unknown. But as far as I know fatherlessness is a common occurrence among gangs… and they’re always shooting each other in Chicago.

        “tightening regulations”–how so? From NRA’s Colion Noir’s claims there are about 20,000 gun laws in the US already. That’s pretty highly regulated already well beyond the 2nd amendment in my opinion. I don’t want some nut to get a hold of a gun either, but the fact is sometimes people just go nuts over time even if they weren’t crazy in the past. That’s part of the risk of freedom… people can abuse it. I’d rather have that risk than an oppressive government fathering over us if we can choose one or the other. The newest “red flag” law considerations are also concerning as they bypass due process and could be substantiated on fake claims. I just find some people(not necessarily those here) claiming guns should be confiscated more and more lately. That’ll start a war with more gun death in this country than ever before.

        Uhmm… my change happened upon being challenged on Torah keeping(about 4 years ago) for Christians as I began to try to take a more historical perspective on the Bible. As I recognized that Jesus wasn’t contradicting the Torah with his teachings(mainly the Sermon the Mount) but rather contradicting the religious leaders mis-use of the Torah I began to take the OT more seriously. Even if it’s not all directly applicable I took principles out of it to guide my life. I find it odd how so many will use what they want in the OT(such as a tithe, or a Proverb or a Psalm, the flowery nice stuff, etc…) but then the moment you point out Torah laws they don’t like it turns into “No that’s not applicable to me today.” Well Paul said and taught otherwise(2 Tim 3:16) from my understanding even if some of the laws he quotes were taken in a different manner(like muzzling an ox, or honoring your father/mother). Most of it came from verses I read over without much thought til it was given attention to look for it admittedly.

        As Ecclesiastes 3 says:
        1 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:

        2 a time to be born, and a time to die;
        a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
        3 a time to kill, and a time to heal;
        a time to break down, and a time to build up;
        4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
        a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
        5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
        a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
        6 a time to seek, and a time to lose;
        a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
        7 a time to tear, and a time to sew;
        a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
        8 a time to love, and a time to hate;
        a time for war, and a time for peace.

        If all the rest are true, why deny vs. 3 and vs. 8?
        (and there’s a book on this exact subject called “A Time to Kill” by Greg Hopkins if you want to read more)

        Basically if it can be determined it seems that non-violence should generally be adopted upon attack for one’s faith and much of this direction from Jesus to his apostles(and later disciples) was for the upcoming judgement in 70AD. I believe they knew that judgment was coming soon upon Jerusalem based on the OT prophecies and Jesus’ words so they knew letting the authorities and such attack them was going to “pay off.” Rarely did individual attacks occur from my understanding in the Acts of the Apostles… it was usually government or mobs of which fighting would be useless… running would be a better option. My opinion would be that many directions even given to the apostles may not at all be applicable to us today depending on the context. Jesus also never said if some random thief tried to attack you or break into your home that you couldn’t defend against this act. So I assume he’s upholding the OT Torah in his time period under the Torah from which I quoted above a few times.

        • You mention Chicago. Are you from the Chicago area? My statement regarding tightening regulations was an off-hand general comment. I have not researched the current regulations regarding gun ownership and only know what I have heard. If you feel that current regulations are sufficient and additional regulations won’t improve anything, I wouldn’t argue.

          I guess your stance makes sense if you feel Christian are still bound to keep Mosaic Law. I don’t think you can use 2 Timothy 3:16 as support for that stance though. Though you may feel Paul is talking about Mosaic Law in that verse, he doesn’t explicitly say so. Furthermore, the majority of the OT Scripture is the “Prophets” while the “Law” constitutes only portions of the Torah. The OT is useful, but Paul explicitly states that OT law is not binding to those who are in Christ in other places including Galatians 3.

          I remain unconvinced by your explanations thus far, but I will echo Paul’s statements in Roman 14 and say it is ultimately your choice to decide whether nor not to use violence in a situation. Perhaps it is best for me to listen to Paul when he says not to judge someone else’s servant.

  • Sean,

    Thank you so much for your positive influence in my life. I’ve benefited a great deal from your ministry, and I appreciate it.

    I listened to the Beating Guns episode the other day and I listened to your response to a comment on that episode at the end of the Detoxing your brain part 1 episode this morning. You mentioned that no one had commented on the previous non violence episodes, but that you had been getting a good bit of feedback on the guns episode. I found no reason to comment on those episodes since I agreed with pretty much everything you had to say in them.

    I completely agree that Christians are called by Jesus to love their enemies and I don’t see how a Christian can intentionally kill another person and love them at the same time. I also agree that occasions may arise when the most loving thing you can do for aggressors and the ones they are hurting would be to intervene by using force that may even injure the aggressor. Such an intervention could potentially lead to an opportunity for the aggressor to reconsider their ways and repent whereas killing them would effectively prevent any such opportunity in the future.

    It’s one thing to encourage Christians to fully embrace the difficult teaching of Jesus to love, do good to, and pray for their enemies, but it’s a very different thing to promote a political response to gun violence. I’m completely in favor of the first, but I think we should be very careful about how we allow our views as Christians to play out in the way we may engage in politics and the way that we might inadvertently influence others to embrace dangerous political ideologies through our speech.

    I completely agree that all the mass shootings are tragic and I think we should do what we can to help prevent such events in the future. I agree with your point that escaping violence from a person with a knife or a bolt action rifle would be easier than escaping violence from a person with an automatic rifle, and that if the killer only had a knife or a bolt action rifle then probably fewer people would be killed, which would of course be preferable. To argue that it would be better if fewer people were murdered is pretty uncontroversial, but we would do well to consider what political measures would be required to keep automatic weapons out of the hands of these killers, if those measures would actually be effective in achieving the intended goal, and what the potential side effects of the political measures might be.

    I don’t know what your experience with government has been, but my own dealings with government have been almost entirely negative. I’m not saying that I’m frequently on the wrong side of the law, though I have let my license plate expire on too many occasions. What I am saying is that I frequently feel the heavy weight of compliance with the regulations of government that were put in place for legitimate purposes, and that the burden of compliance and the negative side effects of those regulations are often far worse than the supposed benefits derived from the regulation.

    I think that this particular issue could prove to be an extreme example of that phenomenon. As I see it, governments throughout history have grown and inserted themselves into many areas of life that they have no legitimate business being involved in and have created many problems inherent in their own bureaucracy that are far greater than the problems that the regulations they instituted were designed to solve. Regulations have taken a great variety of forms with effects that can sometimes be hard to anticipate. A local government near me took its cue from the fascists by deciding which garbage collection company will provide service to the residents in the city (some would argue that this mild intrusion of government is a good thing and others wouldn’t). On the other extreme we’ve had totalitarian governments such as Communist Russia and China that have exterminated large swathes of their citizens who disagreed with their ideologies after confiscating their guns.

    I seriously doubt that nations will cease from waging war with one another or that the governments of the world will all disarm themselves in an effort to live in peace and harmony with each other before the return of Jesus. Because we have always been and will in all likelihood continue to be saddled with governments who use violence or the threat of violence to further their agendas, I think that having a well armed society is probably single the best deterrent against having a corrupt government make the transition into full blown totalitarianism. Restricting gun control or the type of guns that people can own is a slippery slope down a path that I don’t think we should go as a nation. In my opinion, one of the wisest things that the founders of the United States did was to specifically limit the powers of government and to divide up the powers of government and institute checks and balances between the States and between the branches of the federal government. Guns in the hands of citizens can function as one more check or balance against the evil overgrowth of government. Theoretically taking the guns out of the hands of mass murderers by taking guns from everyone is a nice fairy tale idea, but it’s a false narrative about reality actually works. Taking guns away from society at large leaves them completely vulnerable to the whims of a government that may develop a totalitarian bent which would present a much larger danger to society than the relatively small number of disturbed people who engage in mass shootings present. And it’s false to think that such disturbed people wouldn’t turn to other methods of violence that might be even more devastating. There is little reason to think that people who want to kill a bunch of random people because they are upset with the world and just want to take revenge on strangers would find the lack of guns to be an obstacle at all. All they would really need to do is do an internet search on how to build pipe bombs and a trip to a hardware store to get most of the resources that they would need to wreak havoc on their neighbors. All the gun control in the world won’t stop that kind of motivated deviant from causing trouble, and violent criminals are going to be violent regardless of how hard it is for them to get whatever weapons they require.

    My point is that gun control laws have little if any hope of achieving the kind of results that upstanding members of society would like to achieve through their use, and that such laws have the indirect effect of removing some of the obstacles totalitarianism and they inherently increase the strength of government which is almost always a bad idea, in my opinion.

    Don’t get me wrong, I’m not arguing that Christians should be among those who might shoot the offending members of government if crazy laws were enacted and the police were to start imprisoning all the Unitarians for example, but I am saying that a society that is armed is inherently safer from governments gone bad and that shifting more power toward the government is almost always a bad idea perhaps more so with this issue than any other. So while I agree that Christians should discipline themselves to grow in love for their enemies I fear that some of your listeners might allow their zeal for the kingdom of God to carry over into their secondary role as citizens of secular nations in ways that would be unwise.

    It’s not always the case that we should seek to have legislation put in place by the secular state that seeks to enforce the morality that we would preach to our churches. We should preach that God is one, but I would not be in favor of any government making a law requiring that belief any more than I would be in favor of a law requiring belief in the Trinity. We’ve seen the devastating effect of merging the church with the state throughout history, and we should consider the lessons that history has to teach us carefully. In my opinion governments should be given the bare minimum of power that is required to do the jobs that only government can really do and that governments should be limited in every possible respect, perhaps more so regarding this issue than any other because governments have often been tyrannical, most governments are tyrannical in at least some respects, and they can easily become tyrannical in other respects if their power isn’t tightly restricted.

    Besides all that, I think that there are lots of other opportunities that we have to influence the world for good that have a far greater chance at success. Encouraging our kids to be kind to people in their schools that are alienated from society could possibly make the important difference that could keep one of those young men from becoming the sort of violent person that would want to kill a bunch of kids might be a good start. Reminding the world of what it looks like for people who have the love of God in them to respond to evil like the Amish community did when their kids were killed in the West Nickel Mines school shooting would be another. I’d love to hear an interview with someone from that group FYI. There are lots of possible ways that we could influence the world to go in a less violent direction that would also serve to build the kingdom of God at the same time. There are lots of creative and smart people out there who love God and Jesus who have non violent convictions. I suggest that since gun violence is a problem and since there is apparently a lot of interest in resolving it that you have further interviews with people who may have some good ideas about how we can individually contribute to building a more peaceful world and how we can corporately engage with those around us in ways that might really help.

    Thanks again for your ministry, keep up the good work.

    Paul

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