FEATURED VIDEO

"Made a visit to the Army Navy Church, where many nice people go. Where military hearts wear masks of fear because people are our foe. Our smiling teeth sing John 3:16 as we hide behind our war machines, and the love of God there is a dead end street that ends in a heart of stone. Why do we want to war and fight while we claim to have the light? The world in darkness turns away from every word we have to say."

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 This story of the ArmyNavy Church began one day when I was looking for a folding camp stool. I thought Army Navy stores might carry them so I looked up a store in the phone book.

 Upon arriving I was impressed that there were scriptures painted on the windows of the storefront. "What a nice thing to do," I thought. "Christians must run this store."

  A few months later, I passed by the store again and a question began to dawn on me. How can military mindedness be supported by what Jesus taught in the New  Testament? I've come to believe that it can't.

I know that this Army Navy store with the sciptures on the window was not intended to be a church, but it is like the church. Scriptures on the outside but war on the inside. The store portrayed the nature of most of the church. I decided to bring the issue to people's attention.

I don't mean to be disrespectful towards those who have fought in the armed services. I have friends in the service. Most of them are doing what they believe is right. America was founded on the blood of men who fought against tyranny. It's a patriotic tradition that we all have been taught from childhood. It is not my purpose to condemn, judge or bring guilt, it is just to shed the Light of the Word of God on the subject.

It's just that I can't reconcile military mindedness with the Spirit of the New Testament. I'm presenting this series of The ArmyNavy Church to get people to stop for a minute, put tradition aside long enough to listen to what The Word of God in the New Testament says about loving one's enemies and how deep this goes.

The church talks about forgiveness and turning the other cheek but is military mindedness practicing this? Shouldn't Christians be like Christ? Different from the world? By killing our enemies, we present a poor witness to the lost world. We want God to love and forgive us our sins and trespasses, but it ends there. We claim to be children of God, but we don't pass his kind of unconditional love to others.

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THE ARMYNAVY CHURCH
PART 2