The Difficulty of a Christian Response to Syria

The "red line" has been crossed.  Probably more than once.  Innocent children are dying.

What should we do about Syria?  The country is imploding.  Assad's venom is spilling helter-skelter into the streets.  How should we respond?  

We have the power to stop the killing - for now.  We - as in the USA, my home country - could bomb Syria's government out of power, probably.  We could send in an army to displace him and to set up a new leadership.  Or, we could "punish" the use of chemical weapons through "targeted" airstrikes.  

The problem - as if there is only one problem - is that none of this may work.  We could intervene militaristically and hit all our "targets" and yet leave Syria in a worse place.  Even unseating Assad offers no hope of a better Syria.  The opposition is fractured and often aligned with militant Islam.  As we've seen in Iraq, removing a dictator often leads to chaos.  

The other problem is that the global community is not unified in how to respond.  The rules of the United Nations require a resolution from the UN Security Council before one nation can "legally" take military action within the borders of another nation.  Russia and China are likely to block any resolutions to this effect for Syria because they could very well be in the same boat as Syria in a decade or two.  Therefore, any military action would be strictly speaking "illegal" and against international norms, not to mention without the support or approval of most of the world.  Hence, America would look like the cowboy aggressor once again asserting their (im)moral dominance in the world.  

The other, other problem.  Violence begets violence.  Bombing Syria at this point would provide infinite fodder for the recruitment of future terrorists.  These terrorists would flourish in the Middle East, but they would naturally spread to other corners of the globe.  As Israel has proven relentlessly (and Boston more recently), no amount of military might can protect a people from a man with a backpack full of explosives.  

Thus we get to the other, other, other problem.  Doing nothing is equally distasteful.  Do we just sit idly by while children are gassed?  How many dead children does it take to merit crushing the murderer?  Is it morally wrong to stand on the sidelines of genocide wagging our fingers in moral outrage?  Is it enough to offer aid to the victims while doing nothing material to stop the atrocities?  This is the old question that Dietrich Bonhoeffer faced in Nazi Germany.  When a madman is driving a car down a pedestrian filled street mowing down innocent people, at what point is the wise and godly choice simply to shoot the driver?

King and Gandhi (and perhaps Jesus) would tell us that we should flood Syria with innocent protestors, that we should simply line up before Assad's tanks and cannons until Assad and his army became so disgusted with killing us that they laid down their arms and sought a solution for peace and justice.  Perhaps this really is the call of Jesus to lay down our lives for others.  However, it is so dramatic and so radical that I don't hear anyone advocating this - not even my most pacifistic preacher friends.  Moral finger wagging is worse than pointless.  Assisting the victims is admirable, but at what point do we stop the ones committing the atrocities?  

Personally, I am not a militarist hawk.  We have caused great harm in the world by over-using our military strength.  But I'm also not a passive pacifist.  Moral outrage without weighty action is a farce.  But let's not be simplistic.  The only option for a true pacifist here is martyrdom.  However, I do not feel called to walk into Syria to be a martyr nor to ask others to do this.  Perhaps I have a lack of faith.  Perhaps I do not want to understand Jesus' calling on this issue.  I honestly don't know.

So what do we do about Syria?  The problem is that there are so many problems.  Every option is bad.

Killing our Hostility (Ephesians 2:11-22)

11 Don’t forget that you Gentiles used to be outsiders. You were called “uncircumcised heathens” by the Jews, who were proud of their circumcision, even though it affected only their bodies and not their hearts. 12 In those days you were living apart from Christ. You were excluded from citizenship among the people of Israel, and you did not know the covenant promises God had made to them. You lived in this world without God and without hope. 13 But now you have been united with Christ Jesus. Once you were far away from God, but now you have been brought near to him through the blood of Christ.

14 For Christ himself has brought peace to us. He united Jews and Gentiles into one people when, in his own body on the cross, he broke down the wall of hostility that separated us. 15 He did this by ending the system of law with its commandments and regulations. He made peace between Jews and Gentiles by creating in himself one new people from the two groups. 16 Together as one body, Christ reconciled both groups to God by means of his death on the cross, and our hostility toward each other was put to death.

17 He brought this Good News of peace to you Gentiles who were far away from him, and peace to the Jews who were near. 18 Now all of us can come to the Father through the same Holy Spirit because of what Christ has done for us.

19 So now you Gentiles are no longer strangers and foreigners. You are citizens along with all of God’s holy people. You are members of God’s family. 20 Together, we are his house, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets. And the cornerstone is Christ Jesus himself. 21 We are carefully joined together in him, becoming a holy temple for the Lord. 22 Through him you Gentiles are also being made part of this dwelling where God lives by his Spirit.

We have often read this text when we are talking about our church’s vision of being a multicultural community.  We want to embrace our differences as God brings us together through Christ.  The theological roots for this part of our vision are here in Ephesians 2, so we we have turned to this text again and again for encouragement and inspiration.

But as far as I can remember, before today, we’ve never preached directly on this text.  I expected to do some basic teaching and encouragement about being a multicultural community, breaking down cultural barriers and being one in Christ.  But I kept getting stuck on the middle part of this passage.

• “... he broke down the wall of hostility that separated us.”  What was that wall of hostility?  How did it separate us?
• “He did this by ending the system of the law with its commandments and regulations.”  Wait, huh?  How does ending the system of the law break down walls of hostility?  What is the connection between law and hostility?  And how does ending the system of the law make any difference in reconciliation or peace?
• “... by means of his death on the cross ... our hostility to each other was put to death.”  The Greek here is that Jesus actually “killed the hostility” in his body on the cross.  How does that work?  How does Jesus’ death “kill” our hostility for each other?