Facts for Regular Christians on the Bombing of Iran

Facts for Regular Christians on the Bombing of IranHeath LambertJust the FactsFor the last several months, the relationship between the United States and Iran has been strained. That is saying something for two countries that have been locked in conflict for half a century. The strain exists because Iran refuses to embrace the American demand that their country must never possess a nuclear weapon. For months, the two powers have been engaging in basically fruitless negotiations while the United States has placed a massive military force in the region.On Saturday, February 28, the American military, in cooperation with the Israeli Defense Force, began an aerial bombardment that killed many Iranian leaders, including the Ayatollah Khamenei. Authorities say the campaign could last for weeks.Those are the facts on the American bombing of Iran. There is a great deal of debate about nearly everything else. In a difficult and confusing situation, I want to speak to regular Christians who do not have jobs in the halls of political power and who do not get intelligence briefings, but who are watching reports on the news and social media, trying to make sense of all that is happening. Here are five facts that can help those regular Christians make sense of the bombing of Iran.The President Can Do ThisThe first fact is that the president of the United States is within his constitutional authority to engage in this military operation. This fact has become confusing over the last few days, with some who differ with the presidential decision calling it illegal and insisting that only Congress can declare war. Regardless of what you have heard, the real debate is not over the legality of the action, but over who supports the current president. With very few exceptions, the people who support the action are the people who typically support the president, and those opposed are usually at odds with the president.The authoritative document that clarifies whether the president can undertake an action like the one in Iran is the Constitution of the United States. The Constitution makes clear that the president of the United States is the commander-in-chief of the United States military and is well within his authority to direct military operations like the current one.That same Constitution does make clear that only Congress can declare war. But the last time the United States Congress used that authority was in 1942 during World War II. Every military conflict in the last 84 years has been prosecuted by Republican and Democratic presidents without a formal declaration of war from Congress. This incumbent president is doing what every president has done since Harry Truman.  It is not usually appropriate for Christians to support or reject an entire initiative based on our opinion of one man. Of course, everyone has preferences and prejudices. But Christians cannot base their decisions on bias alone, but must have positions informed by fact.The Iranian Regime Is WickedA second fact regular Christians must embrace is that the Iranian regime is wicked. The regime currently being destroyed has been a hostile and terroristic state for my entire lifetime. They have sponsored terror, kidnapped and killed American hostages, jailed pastors, pledged to kill Jews, and have executed their own people into the countless thousands. The people of Iran have been oppressed for decades by a ruthless theocracy that violently suppresses any alternative point of view. Most notably, the Iranian leadership has been desperate for a nuclear weapon that even their allies like Russia do not want them to have.Iran is a rogue, corrupt, dangerous, and isolated state whose neighbors in the region are thankful for the current action, which is crippling their military capability.In a situation like this one, many factors rise to the surface about which good people could disagree. For Christians, the most important issues are the ones of basic morality. The rampant wickedness and corruption of Iran provide the most important moral justification for this military action. The current Iranian leadership has opposed righteousness for their entire existence. That makes it a good thing to oppose them.Getting the Truth Takes WorkA third fact that should help regular Christians is that getting the truth takes work. Misinformation is easy to get. Facts take some effort.Over the weekend, I was in a conversation at First Baptist Church about the death of the Ayatollah when a member of our student ministry said, “It’s not true! He’s alive! The president is lying.” The student held up a cell phone revealing a social media post stating the reports of the death of the Ayatollah were false and showing video of him speaking. I squinted, removed my phone from my pocket, and opened my browser to the websites of Fox News and The New York Times. Both websites were running headlines declaring that the Ayatollah was, indeed, dead.All of us regular Christians are required to rely on others for information about this conflict. That means we must be very careful who we trust to give us this information. We need a high standard for what we declare to be a fact. This high standard will not be reached by swapping conspiracy theories in our living rooms or reading social media posts from people with nothing to lose from telling a lie.Christians are entitled to a broad range of opinions. We are not entitled to a broad range of facts. Before you say something is true, you should check multiple credible sources that have something to lose when they report error.Having an Opinion Requires HumilityA fourth helpful fact for regular Christians is that having an opinion takes humility.The world is full of talking heads and hot takes that freely share their different and competing opinions about the best thing to do in this current situation. Many of us normal Christians love to share our conflicting points of view about how best to handle this whole thing. It is not wrong to have a fact-informed opinion, but most regular folks could afford to embrace their opinions with greater humility.Romans 12:3 teaches regular Christians to be very humble about how we think about things, “I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment.” You may have a very strong opinion about the Iranian action, and your opinion may be the correct one. But at least two pieces of information will help you have a lot of humility about your own opinion.The first piece of information is that if you are one of the regular Christians I am talking to, then no one has given you any authority to make any decisions about this matter. Neither your strong opinion nor the interest of your friends in it qualifies you to be a decision maker on this issue. Donald Trump—love him or hate him— is the only human being alive elected by a majority of Americans to be the commander-in-chief. When he was campaigning for his office, he openly expressed his willingness to bomb Iran. That means that the system is working, ballots have been cast, and the decisions have been made. In future elections, we will have other opportunities to make different decisions, but not right now. Right now, power has been distributed, and that power has not come to any of us. Neither the strength nor the accuracy of our opinions can change that. It will help us be humble when we remember none of us are the ones anyone trusts to make these decisions.A second piece of information that should humble us is just how little we know. When you take the most care possible in digesting the most accurate information, you are still guaranteed to possess only a tiny fraction of information that those in authority have. Every regular Christian has no option but to entrust ourselves to the people in authority who have more information than we do. That is very humbling.Whether You Agree or Disagree, You Must PrayA final fact regular Christians must embrace is the command to pray.This can be a difficult fact to remember with all the questions people are asking right now: Was a military campaign like this one wise? Was this the right time to do it? Are we going about it in the right way? Will the power that fills the vacuum created by these strikes be better or worse than the power getting eradicated? Lots of folks will disagree about lots of things on a matter as important as this one. If all you do is listen to the regular Christians out there, you might think that the most important thing the followers of Christ could be doing right now is publicly sharing their opinions on these matters.That is not true. God neither commands us to have an opinion on these matters nor weigh in on them publicly. He does command us to pray. In 1 Timothy 2:1-2, the Bible says, “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercession, and thanksgiving be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions of authority.”Christians are free to think this bombing is wise or unwise. Christians are free to express concerns about what happens going forward. We are not free to avoid praying. It is a condemnation of too many regular Christians that they spend mountains of time doing all sorts of things the Bible is silent about and no time doing the main thing the Bible is clear about.Every Christian must pray for the president and everyone else making decisions about this action. We must pray for the members of the military executing the decisions made by their superiors. We must pray for the innocent people of Iran that they would be protected from death and destruction. We must pray for Christians in Iran that God would use this tragedy to expand his church. We must pray for the future of Iran that God would raise righteous leaders and a wise government. We must pray because the God of heaven and earth, who ultimately controls the future of this action, hears our prayers and will answer them. It is the best and most profitable action we could take.Have an opinion. Express that opinion if it is in keeping with wisdom. But at all costs, pray.That is the most important lesson for regular Christians during the bombing of Iran.