What Do I Think About the War in Iraq etc.?

(by Bill Stevenson-- April 4, 2006

I almost write this with fear and trembling because of recently getting two or three individuals
very angry at me for just asking a proud mother if her young son was a Christian. My motive
was so that I can know what to pray for and about. So here goes in response to a friend’s very
strong statement which almost seems that he might have hatred against President Bush and his
staff. But most of the Congressmen and Senators voted to give them permission to do whatever
to serve punishment to Saddam for not obeying 18 orders from the United Nations. I have been
saddened how the quality of politicians has gone down, down, down. I thought that again I had
to vote the lesser of two evils in Gore and Bush. I went with the latter only because I thought he
might be more of a Bible reader and more of a Christian than his father was, but I thought he
might also want to help the New World Order Government be developed too. I still remember
when he could not remember some of the world leaders names in a press conference and I didn't
like his sarcastic smirk. But with Gore, we didn't know which Gore would show up each time he
was in the public. And he didn't seem spiritual at all. I was stunned by the 9/11 attack and later
thought that only invading Afghanistan to look for the Al Queda leaders would be all that was
necessary. I was glad that Gore hadn't won, because (remembering what Clinton had done in the
Yugoslavia area that Brother Jennings mentioned), I thought that he might even had nuked
Afghanistan. I know enough about the wars in the Bible and the wars in other history to hate this
activity of humankind. If only Adam and Eve hadn't eaten the forbidden fruit, ................... And
even if the non-religious Golden Rule was lived by all (or at least most), we would not have had
wars. But we have to face reality. Wishing doesn't change things.
Then when the Iraq controversy heated up in the United Nations, most of us didn't really
know how horrible Saddam and his sons especially had been as Brother Campbell indicated.
And he had ordered WMDs used in Iran and in the Kurdish community in the north. I believe
the new reports that such weapons were taken to Syria by Russian special forces just before the
war started. Most, if not all of the Middle East leaders feared him. I thought that he would have
his army fight dirty. I also became concerned about the type of soldiers we were sending this
time. Many of them were video game addicts and you know that most of the popular video
games have horrible violence and killing in them. (BTW, the creator of the non-violent Tetris
game was a Communist Russian who thought that most of the games would be as I said.) But
these games are not real, but war is very real. I thought that today's soldiers would be much
more shocked than those in previous wars when they discovered that real war is not like a video
game of such. I believe that there will be a higher percentage of mental illness in our soldiers
from this war than the previous ones, even the Vietnam when many of the soldiers were despised
instead of welcomed when returning to their home towns. My oldest nephew did two tours in
Iraq for Army motor pool and didn't have to do what he did in video games using guns and other
weapons. But he saw enough to really disturb him so much to hate our government leaders and
war. After his discharge he spent months touring Europe trying to find himself and purpose in
life and them more touring in Hawaii and the USA. He still has not settled down for schooling
or work. He had left church when he was in junior high and now despises God. He was able to
get to the bedside of a good friend in Texas just before she let herself die of cancer. His favorite
cat died too. Later he asked his mother, how could she believe in a God who allows good people
and animals. I responded by writing two essays and a Bible study about such. How many Troys
have been produced by this war?
It is said that hindsight is 20/20, but we cannot suddenly go back in time and do things
differently like happens in some movies. Some including the kicked-out head of the UN
Inspection team said that we should have given Saddam more time to cooperate, but what
guarantees were there that Saddam wouldn't have started the war once he got more weapons
shipped to him and created within Iraq? And I have read of some who said we should have just
sent missiles and bombers flying very high like President Clinton had ordered previously hoping
for no loss of American lives. President Bush did the start of the war like is indicated in the
Bible with warning to the whole country, not with trumpets, but via leaflets dropped from
airplanes. I don't think any war was started that way. The rest were started in secrecy and
completely a surprise. I agree that many mistakes have been made since then, but most of the
mistakes were done by those video game addicts I mentioned before who were very immature
(most just out of high school) and with just average IQs.. There has been a lot of most
unreported good that has happened to in Iraq. But now that many Americans (not just military)
are in Iraq, we do need to pray for them, including for their leaders too. So I have done a lot of
intercessory prayer for all who have been and are involved.
Brother Campbell is right about the enemy outside and from within. The terrorist enemies are
uncivil because they think they will be blessed by Allah for killing non-believers. But in our so-
called civil country, why hasn't family and multi-killing and abortion been stopped? Has the Iraq
War kept the terrorists too busy to attack the USA again or have the security agencies and
foreign governmental cooperation stopped all of the planned attacks up to now? I have prayed a
lot for prevention of any attacks planned for major happening, like the Super Bowl and the
Democratic and Republican National Conventions. I did the same after each threat of violence
was made, like the one promising to destroy the Golden Gate Bridge and 4 other popular bridges.
Now I am very tired of no real progress being done in the attempt to form an Iraq government
and I am concerned about the increase of hatred worldwide, especially in the USA. But many
say we can't just pull out our military from Iraq yet or chaos or civil war would happen. And
even getting rid of the present administration would not help matters either. In 2004, I would
have voted for Senator Lieberman or even Senator McCain. Even others in the Democratic
leadership would have been much better than John Kerry. The election was close only because
of the hatred against President Bush. I do not like other changes in policies of the just mentioned
and the fact that he has not vetoed any spending bills. I don't even like his giving into the anti-
Christmas tree pro Holiday tree crowd because he said we shouldn't offend other religions and
his proclaiming that Islam is a religion for peace. (I have proof that the latter is not true.) And
then how he has allowed FEMA and the Homeland Security Departments to become
incompetent and terrible for the most part. Just think if there were one or two terrorist attacks
soon after the Katrina storm had done its damage. So my question is, what do we do we at least
pray for now? What changes are needed? How many right now in the various communities are
really trying to show Christian compassion the returning soldiers. How do we decrease the
hatred, even of the politicians? What do we pray for to happen to stop any future wars?
I believe that the Age of Grace will soon be ending. It seems we are in the Last Days before
the fulfillment of 1 Corinthians 15 and other prophecies. So we Christians should be doing all
we can for the Great Commission, sharing God's wonderful Salvation and the other wonderful
truths in the Bible. Are we increasing the time we live unselfishly for others? Are more
individuals in our lives appreciating our Christian lifestyle? If we say that President Bush is not
a Christian, have we done whatever we can to witness to him or witness to his advisors? Or at
least prayed for them that they would become true Christians. I think that President Bush might
barely be saved, but like most has not been Biblically discipled. Many leaders in the past read
the Bible a lot and went to church regularly, but were sincerely wrong in most of their decisions,
like President Woodrow Wilson allowing a Communistic advisor persuade him to get laws
passed (mostly in 1914) to change the USA from a republic to a democracy. (The Founding
Fathers knew that democracies resulted in anarchy or dictatorship.) And did you know that
every dominating nation or empire has been ruined from within via the breakdown of the family
and morality within 300 years?