Faith and Firearms: Should Christians Own Guns?

[OldSchool2]

Many christian Germans where tortured and forced into the war.

Children in school were obligated to say hail Hitler in the commencement of their day....

That's not torture; it's called indoctrination, e.g., enrollment into the Hitler Youth was mandatory.

Further, many Germans were "... persuaded by the statement on 'positive Christianity' in Article 24 of the 1920 Nazi Party Platform ... Despite the open antisemitism of this statement and its linkage between confessional 'freedom' and a nationalistic, racialized understanding of morality, many Christians in Germany at the time read this as an affirmation of Christian values."

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005206

[Matthew T.]

I tell ya what, though it is a great challenge for sure, a person does well to let scripture interpret life instead of having life interpret scripture.

 

This subject of "Should Christians Own Guns"? That has a very simple answer. But if you'll see what's happening here, some are attempting to apply one perspective to a dozen different subjects. The different subjects are being confused because of one common denominator, guns.

 

I haven't forgotten about this subject. However, I am seeing that any answer offered is going to be very lengthy in order to address all the different subjects that have come into the minds of men when they think of "guns". 

[other one]

We should keep in mind that there wasn't a thing such as guns in Jesus day. So we should.not be looking for guns in the Bible. When he sent out the deciples where they were carrying money, he told them to buy a sword. Swords are a little outdated and the weapons today for that kind of protection would be a handgun

[Matthew T.]

We should keep in mind that there wasn't a thing such as guns in Jesus day. So we should.not be looking for guns in the Bible. When he sent out the deciples where they were carrying money, he told them to buy a sword. Swords are a little outdated and the weapons today for that kind of protection would be a handgun

 

This is true. The same can be said of automobiles. They aren't in the Bible. What if we were to ask ourselves, "Should Christians own Automobiles"? They have also been used as instruments of violence countless times.

 

The subject requires discernment that goes beyond, way beyond, any one verse. It requires knowing God, not knowing "about" God. It requires knowing what the Old Covenant was and why its accounts were given to the Gentiles. It requires knowing what was completed in the old and began anew in the testimony of the covenants. It requires a knowledge of the heart of God. It requires separating different subjects pertaining to different uses and motives. It pertains to knowing what the specific will of God is on any subject on any given day... It requires a GREAT MANY things in discernment that is ALL deeper than surface level.

Edited May 27, 2015 by Matthew T.

[The_Patriot21]

1to, if they are storming houses, raping women and killing minorities, or in full, knowing support of the people who were doing so, the. Yes I can. Christians, true Christians know better. If they didn't know and were tricked then yes they can be Christians but if they knowingly supported and/or participated in what Hitler was doing then they are closer to being the spawn of Satan then they are Christians. I'm sorry if that offends you, but truth hurts.

You will find most of the actual Christians in Germany were fighting Hitler. Either by helping smuggle minorities out of Germany, or in the case of Dietrich Bonhoeffer actively trying to eliminate Hitler from the face of the planet.

And your entire argument is still based upon nothing. Even if they said they were Christians-which they weren't, and they believed God was on their side, which He wasn't, doesn't make them right or wrong. What makes it right or wrong is what the Bible says. The bible says Hitler and his followers were pure evil, and the bible also says that God will protect Israel. God used violence and war yo do so. So regardless of what anyone believes, WW2 was the definition of a just war. Hitler was a evil man and had to be stopped. And he was. End of story.

[Matthew T.]

1to, if they are storming houses, raping women and killing minorities, or in full, knowing support of the people who were doing so, the. Yes I can. Christians, true Christians know better. If they didn't know and were tricked then yes they can be Christians but if they knowingly supported and/or participated in what Hitler was doing then they are closer to being the spawn of Satan then they are Christians. I'm sorry if that offends you, but truth hurts.

You will find most of the actual Christians in Germany were fighting Hitler. Either by helping smuggle minorities out of Germany, or in the case of Dietrich Bonhoeffer actively trying to eliminate Hitler from the face of the planet.

And your entire argument is still based upon nothing. Even if they said they were Christians-which they weren't, and they believed God was on their side, which He wasn't, doesn't make them right or wrong. What makes it right or wrong is what the Bible says. The bible says Hitler and his followers were pure evil, and the bible also says that God will protect Israel. God used violence and war yo do so. So regardless of what anyone believes, WW2 was the definition of a just war. Hitler was a evil man and had to be stopped. And he was. End of story.

 

It's easy to agree with this. It's humanity 101. The ovens hiTLer used to burn scores of Jews to death was unconscionable. hE had to be put down like the eVil dog he was. Some people are the personification and the embodiment of eVil. hiTLer was one of those. A man charged with fighting against hiTLer had to do no more than briefly consult his own conscience to determine that even if it meant his life, he was going to fight to put that eVil down.

 

And so iT was. As a young man, I would have lived for such an opportunity. It would have been an honor to fight in that war.

[1to3]

I don't think you understand what I am trying to say.

Even Christians could not prevent what Hitler was doing.

You don't  know all the facts. And shame on you for making judgements on my family.

I know what my mothers family lived through, you don't, and I know other German, Austrian Christians and Jewish family friends of my mothers who I am very close to.They are in the late seventies to late eighties

I also know a Jewish Austrian lady who I am very close to who was a very good lifelong friend of my mothers. My mother has passed. This ladies mother actually introduced my father to my mother in Canada.  My father was Hungarian and his family immigrated to Canada in the 1920ies, so my father was raised in Canada and did not go through the war. But he was a title attorney -notary- ( not the same as a u.s notary) who helped a lot of war immigrants .

 

My mother, her family and her friends,they live through it.

Just because you have been a christian did not mean that you did not suffer in the war.

Hitler and the SS were totally pure evil. If you knew better the control that was going on you would not be saying what you are saying and making judgements on people you never knew.

As I mentioned my uncle was beaten beaten because my grandfather refused to sign a paper that the school forced on students to sign..

My uncle got severely beaten for this.My uncle fled to Sweden. People were displaced, lost their homes, their lives. It was not only Jewish people who got to suffer and die in Hitlers hell war.

women were raped and killed Jew or no Jew.

[Matthew T.]

1 to 3... Politics always confuses and complicates all things on a personal level... I'm sorry your family experienced what they had to endure as a consequence of simply living where they lived.

 

Terrorism is impossible to understand unless you've lived under its rule. No one can say with certainty what they would or would not do if they or their most cherished loved ones are threatened under terrorism.

 

I'm afraid nothing changed the need to stop hiTLer. hE was stopped...at great expense... to everyone involved.

 

I'm sorry.

[1to3]

Thanks Matt for your words.

[OldSchool2]

I don't think you understand what I am trying to say.

Even Christians could not prevent what Hitler was doing....

Many Christians were actually cooperating with Hitler for "reasons" that ranged from a medieval anti-Semitism to misplaced German nationalism.

"... there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect" (Matthew 24:24).

And I can't help but notice that this thread began with "faith and firearms" and now we're proving Godwin's Law.