Some thoughts on guns this Christmas

This article on "Restoring broken places this Christmas season" really spoke to me. Please read it, and then feel free to read some of my thoughts below

Although many people talk about it like it's true, owning guns is not an inerrant right of human beings, like the freedom to breathe and eat and provide for ourselves. Guns are a cultural thing. We don't need guns. It is not our right to own guns. Guns were a necessity at one point in our country's history because of actual imminent danger - and now, despite living in the most powerful country in the world, with one of the most successful economies and stable governments, many of our citizens insist that we need guns and genuinely believe it is our inherent right to own them. This is a PROBLEM. It is not a human need or a right to own guns - and it is not normal. And by normal I mean it is not the way God created us to be.

God did not create us to love violence, to own a weapon that can kill another person. This is not the way he intended us to be. Because of the sheer amount of and accessibility to guns in the United States, there exists a culture of violence. It is normal in our culture (and therefore not good for us, since God did not create us to be this way) to own guns, think about guns, talk about guns, play with guns, play video games with guns and watch movies with guns....obviously there are other factors that contribute to our violent culture as well (broken families, media, etc), but the fact that guns - a confluence of violence - are such an ingrained part of our nation's consciousness is a huge problem. Playing with violent weapons, owning violent weapons, thinking that violent weapons are our right to have....all this will lead to violence actually happening. And it does.


Side note: I'm not addressing the whole hunting aspect. Nor am I addressing the military. Different situations, different blogs.

What I am addressing is the fact that guns are thought of as inherent right in our country. A weapon, something that we know can take another human right - is though of as something we all need. This causes us to normalize guns, and the violence that guns cause, in our minds

As I said, this is not normal. We were not made for this. God's vision for us, His desire for us, is not to own weapons. It is to beat our "swords into plowshares" (Is. 2:4). There are times, because we live in a fallen world, where military action is necessary for the safety of innocent people and the greater common good. We see in His Word that God recognizes this and even orders military action at times. But that does not mean using weapons and accepting violence as a part of our daily lives is what He desires. No, throughout Scripture we see His actual vision for us and this world. We see His heart. He desires swords (or guns...) to be exchanged for tools of peace and sustenance. This vision is for us today - He asks us to walk in His ways, to have his heart, to help make this world a little more the way it should be.

His vision is that our hearts would break, as His does, when even one life is lost to violence. His vision is one where violence is the exception, not the norm. The article mentioned above shows what this can look like. I truly love America and believe God has used and will continue to use the blessings of our country and the people in it for His purposes. But to be as effective as we can be for His Kingdom, I truly believe our culture must change.

Instead of being a culture where we are so used to gun violence that another school shooting barely causes us to pause in our day, we should be a culture where GUNS in our SCHOOLS causes national outrage from everyone on all sides of the political spectrum - and this outrage should lead to immediate change. The fact that it doesn't shows just how broken our culture is.

Our culture should be one where it is RARE for police to have to use their guns to kill (as is the case in most other developed countries, like Iceland) Our culture should be one where we weep for days when one life is lost to gun violence - not just shake our heads and resume watching TV because lives lost to guns are so normal.

What is the norm in our culture now is not what God desires. So if we claim to follow Christ and seek His vision, then we must seek to change our culture. And we can start with the dark presence of guns.