Leveling Up on Love

Leveling Up On Love

November 10, 2024
Luke 6:27-38. Matthew 5:43-48

But I say to you who are willing to hear: Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on the cheek, offer the other one as well. If someone takes your coat, don’t withhold your shirt either. Give to everyone who asks and don’t demand your things back from those who take them. Treat people in the same way that you want them to treat you.

If you love those who love you, why should you be commended? Even sinners love those who love them.

 Luke 6:27-32 (CEB)

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In Matthew’s telling of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says to “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44).  Luke’s rendition shows us exactly what such love looks like in action.  Turn the other cheek, give freely without expecting anything in return, lend without expecting repayment, show compassion, don’t judge, forgive.” 

Two things I find particularly interesting here:

1. The editors of the Common English Translation title this section of Luke, “Behaving as God’s Children” in contrast to Matthew’s section header, “The Law of Love.”    It’s easy to talk about love in abstract terms, but Luke seems to realize how easy it is to separate what we call “love” from actual actions or behavior.  There are a lot of people who claim to love everyone while behaving in extremely unloving ways. 

2. It seems that Luke’s version of this command is used far more rarely than Matthew’s these days.  A lot of people want to call themselves “Christian” without being bogged down with the nuances of actually “behaving as God’s children.”  Many Christian groups are far more vocal in deciding who they think God’s enemies are and then declaring God’s wrath and judgment upon them.  Some even go to the extreme of seeing themselves as instruments of God’s judgment to condemn or punish the wicked.

In our world, “an eye for an eye” is much more popular than “turn the other cheek.”  Forgiveness and compassion are seen as weak.  And let’s not even talk about  the money issue, “lending without expecting to be paid back in full.”  Our economy thrives on exploiting people’s debt so they pay back far more than they ever borrowed, often over the course of a lifetime. 

Funny how the rules of our culture run so contrary to Jesus’ most basic teaching, and yet we see no conflict between calling oneself a Christian while behaving in greedy, hateful and judgmental ways toward others.  I wonder how many of the rules and laws we want to pass to keep our enemies (or political opponents) in line would be acceptable terms if similar laws were passed against us. 

Many Christians today have a persecution complex.  Despite having a lot more freedom than we realize and holding significant political power at every level, we tend to feel like everybody is out to get us… everybody is our enemy.  Even if that was true, which I do not believe, I wonder how our relationships with those “so-called” enemies might change if we behaved toward them the way Jesus taught and modeled for us. 

Maybe, just maybe, we would make a lot more friends.

Caught Between Truths

Caught Between Truths

November 3, 2024
John 18:33-19:16, Psalm 2

Jesus replied, “My kingdom doesn’t originate from this world. If it did, my guards would fight so that I wouldn’t have been arrested by the Jewish leaders. My kingdom isn’t from here.”

“So you are a king?” Pilate said.

Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. I was born and came into the world for this reason: to testify to the truth. Whoever accepts the truth listens to my voice.”

“What is truth?” Pilate asked…

… From that moment on, Pilate wanted to release Jesus.

John 18:36-38, 19:12

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Jesus is clear that his kingdom is not of this world and that his primary purpose is to “testify to the truth.”  Pilate responds with the question that has haunted us all for over 2,000 years… “What is truth?”

Here in the 21st century, we are still sitting on the edge of our seats waiting for Jesus’ answer, as though the conversation somehow got cut short.  And in the meantime, we have had more than enough “truth-sayers” trying to fill in the blanks with their own answers to this seemingly impossible question.  As a result, we now live in a culture where truth is so drowned out by lies that we can hardly tell the difference.  When lies are told often enough, they don’t necessarily become facts, but they do create a certain kind of truth that shapes reality.  When enough people believe a lie and act on it, it’s veracity no longer matters.  Real people get hurt, and most often it is the innocent and marginalized that are harmed the most. 

Just a few weeks ago a gunman was arrested in North Carolina over threats of potential harm intended against FEMA workers.  Lies and conspiracies about the government relief organization have run rampant in the aftermath of two disastrous hurricanes and the fact that they are not true doesn’t change the real harm they are causing to relief workers and storm victims in desperate need of help.  Sadly, this is only one of many examples where the truth or lack of truth has become irrelevant and caused great harm to entire groups of people throughout our nation during the current election cycle.

The same reality was true for Jesus.  It didn’t really matter whether he was a king or not, or what kind of kingdom he proclaimed.  It didn’t matter if he actually deserved to die.  For Pilate, and far too often for us, there was a voice far louder than truth.  It was the voice of fear.  The lynch-mob that yelled the loudest got to decide what truth was.  Jesus is guilty… Crucify him!

And in the end, truth surrendered to the fear of the people and quite literally died at the hands of both the mob and the state. 

Jesus says that if his Kingdom were of this world, he would respond with violence as the world does, but instead he chooses not to fight because his Kingdom is not of this world.  How tragic then that his followers across the centuries continue to fight.  We continue to stir up people’s fear with lies and conspiracies for the sake of political power, wealth and security. 

Perhaps the mobs of fearmongers understand Jesus’s truth better than it seems.  The truth of God’s kingdom will not give them the earthly power they desire.  It will call them to surrender and to lay down their lives for the sake of love, even the love of their enemies. 

“What is truth” indeed, that it would call us to sacrifice so much?

It's Not Politics, It's Personal

It’s Not Politics, It’s Personal

October 27, 2024
1 Samuel 18:1-15 , 19:1-10, 20:32-33, 24:1-22, 26:1-25 (esp 19), Psalm 57

Saul ordered his son Jonathan and all his servants to kill David, but Jonathan, Saul’s son, liked David very much.  So Jonathan warned David, “My father Saul is trying to kill you. Be on guard tomorrow morning. Stay somewhere safe and hide.  I’ll go out and stand by my father in the field where you’ll be. I’ll talk to my father about you, and I’ll tell you whatever I find out.”

1 Samuel 19:1-3

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 “Don’t get political.”

This may be one of the most commonly heard statements by preachers from their congregations these days, and the truth is, it’s a much tougher order than one might think. 

First, the gospel is inherently political.  The first creed of the church, “Jesus is Lord,” is a statement of treason that declares “Caesar is not.”  This is the kind of thing that literally gets people killed as political opponents of the empire, and yet as Christians we are called to pledge our soul allegiance to Christ, not to our flag or nation, no matter how Godly we may think it is.

Second, most of the times I’ve heard this statement came in response to the scripture itself, not to any political statement I may or may not have made.  The Sermon on the Mount alone is filled with teachings that go against the grain of our individualistic and capitalistic culture.  All I have to do is read the verses and someone will say, “What radical Marxist or Socialist said that?”  The objector is usually not happy when I respond with “Jesus… see, it’s right here in the Red Letters.”

Third, and perhaps most importantly in our current political climate, is the truth that much of what we call political should not be political at all.  In fact, much of it is simply about how we treat one another as descent human beings, how we show respect and love for all people, neighbor and enemy alike.  These are fundamental truths of our faith and necessary for a healthy society, and yet to call out a candidate for dehumanizing a person or group of people is viewed as a partisan agenda.  When people make broad brush statements that paint those who vote differently as an enemy of the state, or even an enemy of the faith, as I have been called many times, they often don’t even realize that there are members of their own family who are afraid to speak to them because of their inflammatory, derogatory and violent rhetoric.  The truth is, it’s not political, it’s personal. 

King Saul viewed David as a political enemy and a threat to his power.  He wanted David’s head on the end of his spear.  In America, we may not typically shed the blood of our political opponents, but it has happened and could easily happen again if cooler heads cannot find a way to prevail in the public discourse.  One might say that as a King in his day, Saul had every right to kill any threat to his throne, and technically, that would be true.

For Saul’s son Jonathan, however, this wasn’t about politics at all.  David was his best friend.  His father’s rage was deeply personal and he risked everything to protect his friend from his own father.  How many families, friendships, communities, even churches, are torn apart by political divides.  Do we promote candidates that threaten harm to those we love? 

Politics is always personal.  Love must have the final say.

Who Will Protect Us?

Who Will Protect Us?

October 20, 2024
1 Samuel 16:14-23, 1 Samuel 17:32-58, Psalm 27

Then Saul dressed David in his own gear, putting a coat of armor on him and a bronze helmet on his head.  David strapped his sword on over the armor, but he couldn’t walk around well because he’d never tried it before. “I can’t walk in this,” David told Saul, “because I’ve never tried it before.” So he took them off.  He then grabbed his staff and chose five smooth stones from the streambed. He put them in the pocket of his shepherd’s bag and with sling in hand went out to the Philistine.

 1 Samuel 17:38-40

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One of the many idols of our time is the illusion of safety and security.  OK, maybe not always “illusion”.  Relatively speaking, we are probably safer on a day to day basis than many people in the world.  Most of us have good shelter, easily accessible food and water, no immediate physical threats, etc.  Not everyone in the world, or even in our own communities, can say the same. 

I say “illusion,” however, because no matter how hard we try, we cannot be fully protected from every possible harm in this life.  We can build our walls, increase our surveillance, develop better medical treatments, stockpile more money, etc. but there are always risks we cannot account for.

Our economy runs in large part on our desire to keep this illusion intact.  Marketers prey on our desire for safety and security by telling us that we will not really be safe and secure unless we have whatever they are selling, or put our trust in whatever person, organization, or corporation they are promoting.  We buy far more than we would ever need out of an irrational and often unrecognized fear that we may not already have enough.  We vote for leaders who promise to protect us from the most outlandish threats and conspiracies.  We hoard basic necessities during times of crisis or natural disaster leaving hardly anything left on the store shelves or at the gas pumps for those who probably need it more than we do.  There is almost nothing we won’t do when we feel like our safety and security is at risk. 

And then we meet David, a young boy with no military training and no weapons to speak of, preparing to put his life on the line against the greatest enemy his people had.  Even the king and his greatest soldiers were terrified of this Goliath.  So terrified and desperate in fact, that the king himself was willing to put a kid’s life on the line if it meant protecting himself.  But he makes a good show of it.  He offers the kid his royal armor, the best protection and security money could buy.  If David dies out there, it won’t be because the King didn’t do everything possible to guarantee his safety. 

But the armor doesn’t fit.  The weight overwhelms this small shepherd boy and cripples him.  He can’t even walk out onto the field and he can barely lift the sword.  David knew his source of protection was not the security the king or anybody else could offer him.  It was his trust in God alone.

Which begs the question, where is our armor, the things we cling to for safety and security, weighing us down?  When will we stop trusting in the weapons of this world to protect us and truly place our lives in the hands of the God we claim to trust? 

__________

I raise my eyes toward the mountains.
Where will my help come from? 
My help comes from the Lord, 
the maker of heaven and earth

~ Psalm 121:1-2 ~

Rest or React?

Rest or React?

October 13, 2024
1 Samuel 13:1-14, 1 Samuel 15:16-29, Psalm 40:1-17

The very moment Saul finished offering up the entirely burned offering, Samuel arrived. Saul went out to meet him and welcome him.  But Samuel said, “What have you done?”

“I saw that my troops were deserting,” Saul replied. “You hadn’t arrived by the appointed time, and the Philistines were gathering at Michmash.  I thought, The Philistines are about to march against me at Gilgal and I haven’t yet sought the Lord’s favor. So I took control of myself[ and offered the entirely burned offering.”

“How stupid of you to have broken the commands the Lord your God gave you!” Samuel told Saul. “The Lord would have established your rule over Israel forever, but now your rule won’t last.

1 Samuel 13:10-14a

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Saul’s army was deserting.  The enemy was at hand and the battle would surely be lost.  He knew the people needed assurance that God would be with them, but Samuel, the prophet, had not yet arrived to make the appropriate sacrifice and dedicate their battle to the Lord.  So Saul did what any rational leader might do, he stepped up and did what needed to be done.  He offered the sacrifice to rally his people and call upon God’s help.  So what’s the problem?

Samuel shows up a few minutes later and is furious.  From our perspective, this might just look like Samuel is whining because he didn’t get his moment in the spotlight. 

If I was running late to a church meal after church because I was talking with someone, I as the pastor would be grateful if someone else blessed the food and got started.  But Samuel looks like the pastor who comes in late and pitches a fit that they didn’t wait on him or her to say the prayer, as if the pastor was the only one who could offer the blessing. 

On the surface, this makes perfect sense, but God was doing something very different in Israel.  God is trying to clearly establish a hierarchy of power different than any other nation had known.  Rather than the human king having the final authority as was customary, God is establishing a nation where the King is under Divine authority.  In other nations, a prophet could be executed for challenging the king, but in Israel, it was the prophet who would have the final word because it was the prophet who spoke on behalf of God. 

Samuel wasn’t simply throwing a tantrum for not getting to do his part in offering the sacrifice.  His anger reflected God’s disappointment that King Saul chose to elevate himself to a position of final authority, no longer accountable to the prophet, and by extension, to God. 

Saul suffered from a disease we all struggle with.  It’s been called “just-do-something-itus.”  In other words, we are quick to become impatient and want to act immediately.  We speak when we should be silent.  We make careless decisions instead of taking the time to study, to listen, and to discern a wiser course of action.  We react to the perceived danger in the moment instead of resting in the God who promises to stand with us in the fire.  We let our emotions take the driver’s seat and act out of our desire to be in control instead of a place of humility and surrender. 

We always have a choice. 

Will we react in our own strength or rest in God?

We Want a King

We Want a King!

October 6, 2024
Judges 21:25, 1 Samuel 8:1-22 (especially v. 5, 19-20)

In those days there was no king in Israel; each person did what they thought to be right.

Judges 21:25

But the people refused to listen to Samuel and said, “No! There must be a king over us so we can be like all the other nations. Our king will judge us and lead us and fight our battles.”

1 Samuel 8:19-20

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We no longer cry out for a King, but we are still crying for our leaders to fight our battles for us.  We expect our politicians and our military leaders to protect us from other nations, to protect our jobs and our bank accounts, to keep us healthy and well-fed and educated, to maintain a comfortable infrastructure of roads and schools and public servants, etc., and to uphold a particular moral and ethical code for society to function freely.

Though we all have different ideas about how our leaders should go about meeting these needs, how they should fund their projects, and how involved they should be in our everyday life... we are all ultimately  asking for... or voting for the same thing.... We want leaders who will make us strong and competitive like "other nations" and who will "fight our battles for us".... whether our battles against foreign governments, against poverty, against sickness, against crime... against anything that may disrupt our comfortable lives.

Israel’s rejection of God was to have a King like other nations which had ultimate authority over them to  protect them as he saw fit, just like other kings did.  Our leaders are not so powerful... there are limits... checks and balances built into the system... and we view our "kings" as representative of our interests, no matter how diverse and even incompatible those interests may be.

By expecting our leaders to represent us and rule based on what "we the people" deem right and wrong, have we actually reverted to the period of the Judges?

Is it possible that a government "for the people, by the people" is just another way of saying that "each person does what is right in their own eyes..." and that we legitimize it by seeking political representation to make law reflective of what "is right in our eyes".

If this is indeed the case, might our pride and our failures in the American experiment of "self-government" simply be the result of our original sin.... the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and our innate desire to decide for ourselves.... above any king or ruler.... and even above God himself, what is good and evil... and what is right and wrong for us?

And so we find ourselves at a crossroads.  We are living in crisis much like the children of Israel and we have a choice to make.  Will we continue to cry out for a King... whether absolute or merely representative of our own opinions and desires or will we accept that we have had the perfect King all along... that God’s covenant with us still stands... that God has invited us to become citizens of a Divine Kingdom which is not of this world.... and that our very lives depend not on who is in charge of the laws on earth, but rather on how well we obey the laws of Heaven!

Thy Kingdom Come, Thy Will be done... on earth as it is in Heaven.  Amen.

Not Alone

Not Alone

September 29, 2024
John 13:34-35, 1 John 4:7-17

“I give you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, so you also must love each other.  This is how everyone will know that you are my disciples, when you love each other.”

 John 13:34-35

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A story is told of a pastor who trudged through the snow to a rustic log cabin where a parishioner lived.  It had been several months since this hermit of a man had stepped foot in the church, though church members often saw him around town.  The man welcomed the pastor in, offered him a hot cup of coffee and they sat down together in the warm glow of a crackling fire. 

Following their brief but cordial greeting, silence settled over the space.  Not an awkward silence, mind you, rather a holy silence, filled with the whispers of the Holy Spirit to both pastor and parishioner alike.  After a while the pastor reached out and, with a set of wrought iron tongs, he pulled a burning ember out of the fire and placed it carefully on the stone hearth.  The light from the tiny wood chip faded and smoke began to rise.  In no time, this little isolated fire had gone out.

The pastor then carefully placed the smoldering ember back into the fire and in an instant, it glowed brighter than before. 

As he stood up to leave, the parishioner finally broke the silence.  “Thanks for the sermon, preacher.  I’ll see you on Sunday.”

Just like the man hidden away in the warmth of his secluded cabin, there comes a point when our isolated embers will burn out.  We are indeed the church scattered as we live out our faith in our everyday, individual lives, and we must be the church gathered, remaining in the Holy Fire of God’s love  expressed through the love of one another in community. 

If God is love, then relationships are the necessary channel through which that love is expressed and known. As those who seek to follow Christ’s example, we cannot pick and choose who we will love based on preference, affection, similar interests, or agreement of opinions.  We must love as Christ loved us.  We must be vulnerable, serve one another, and open our hearts to the stranger. 

John O’Donohue invites us to bless the space that exists between us so that the walls of division may have no place to stand, and that love will bind all of creation together in the heart of God. 

As a popular benediction from the United Methodist Hymnal declares,

Go now in peace to serve God and your neighbor in all that you do. Bear witness to the love of God in this world, so that those to whom love is a stranger will find in you generous friends.

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Consider a time when you felt the most lonely or isolated, when you felt like a stranger.  How did you experience God in that season of your life?

What does “community” mean to you?  Where do you most experience authentic community in your life?  Where do you truly belong?

Honest Faith

Honest Faith: Moving from Certainty to Trust

September 22, 2024
Hebrews 11:1, James 2:14-26

Faith is the reality of what we hope for, the proof of what we don’t see.  The elders in the past were approved because they showed faith.   By faith we understand that the universe has been created by a word from God so that the visible came into existence from the invisible.

Hebrews 11:1-3

My brothers and sisters, what good is it if people say they have faith but do nothing to show it? Claiming to have faith can’t save anyone, can it?  Imagine a brother or sister who is naked and never has enough food to eat.  What if one of you said, “Go in peace! Stay warm! Have a nice meal!”? What good is it if you don’t actually give them what their body needs?  In the same way, faith is dead when it doesn’t result in faithful activity.  

James 2:14-17

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“When the brilliant ethicist John Kavanaugh went to work for three months at ‘the house of the dying’ in Calcutta, he was seeking a clear answer as to how best to spend the rest of his life. On the first morning there he met Mother Teresa. She asked, ‘And what can I do for you?’ Kavanaugh asked her to pray for him.

‘What do you want me to pray for?’ she asked. He voiced the request that he had borne thousands of miles from the United States: ‘Pray that I have clarity.’

She said firmly, ‘No, I will not do that.’ When he asked her why, she said, ‘Clarity is the last thing you are clinging to and must let go of.’ When Kavanaugh commented that she always seemed to have the clarity he longed for, she laughed and said, ‘I have never had clarity; what I have always had is trust. So I will pray that you trust God.’”

~ excerpt from Ruthless Trust, Brennan Manning

For far too many Christians, faith is simply a matter of believing that Jesus is the Son of God and that he died to forgive our sins so that we can go to heaven when we die.  Salvation is a simple transaction, his life in exchange for ours. 

Scripture knows nothing of this transactional faith.  There is nothing about believing  a particular theological truth to get some eternal reward in return.  Rather, faith in scripture always results in faithful action, in some sort of movement, or as Kierkegaard scholar Aaron  Simmons puts it, “Faith is Risk with Direction.”

In some ways, Kierkegaard’s Denmark was similar to today’s American South in that so many people simply assume they are Christian by virtue of being born into a Christian home or a Christian culture.  He was convinced, however, that such certainty on the sole  basis of where we were born had no resemblance to the kind of faith Jesus asked of the discipled when he said, “Drop your nets.  Come, follow me.” 

Honest faith moves us to action.  It does not give us certainty, but rather hope in possibilities we cannot yet see or know.  Faith always requires risk.  Are we willing to trust when the path is uncertain; to risk everything to truly follow Christ for the sake of love?

The Sin of Certainty

The Sin of Certainty

Reflections on the Wesleyan Quadrilateral - Experience
September 8, 2024


1 John 1:1-3, Romans 8:16

see also:
John 5:39-40, Matthew 7:15-23

We announce to you what existed from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have seen and our hands handled, about the word of life.  The life was revealed, and we have seen, and we testify and announce to you the eternal life that was with the Father and was revealed to us.  What we have seen and heard, we also announce it to you so that you can have fellowship with us. Our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.

1 John 1:1-3

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“We announce to you what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have seen and our hands handled, about the word of life.”  In other words, what we proclaim to you about God is what we ourselves have seen, heard and touched.  Or to put it another way, we are sharing with you our “experience” of God.

Some have said that we cannot trust our experience because we are fallen human beings tainted by sin.  While there is certainly truth to the ways sin skews our perspective, it is equally true that we cannot know  anything except through the lens of our lived experience.  There is no idealized form of any object that can be described apart from the way one perceives it.  If ten people were to describe a particular tree, for example, there would certainly be similar elements such as color, parts like bark, leaves or branches, perhaps certain textures, etc.  And yet each description would be so unique in other ways that one might wonder if they are all describing the same tree.  One person might notice tiny holes from bugs that were eating at it, and another might notice the moss along the base.  Still another might zero in on a birds nest or a particular knot where a branch seemed to grow in an unlikely direction.  All of these details say as much about our experience of the tree as they do about the tree itself.

If each person would notice different aspects of a tree, how much more will each person have their own unique experience of God.  Even scripture is not “immune” from the impact of experience.  The Biblical writers to not have an objective source of information about God that is universally accepted as scientifically tested and verified fact.  Rather, they each write through the lens of their own experiences of God in their lives.  Abraham encounters God in the visitation of three strangers.  Moses experiences God in a burning bush.  Elijah sees God in the all consuming fire, hears God in the silence, and is nourished by God through bread and rest under the broom tree.  

People experience Jesus differently too.  The lepers and the tax collectors, for example, have a very different perception of who he is than the Jewish leaders who put him on trial.  Everything we know about God is mediated through someone’s experience and more likely, through the culmination of many people’s experiences throughout the centuries including our own.  In his letter to the Romans, Paul says that we “...received a Spirit that shows you are adopted as his children. With this Spirit, we cry, “Abba, Father.” The same Spirit agrees with our spirit, that we are God’s children.  (Romans 8:15-16). 

God sent the Spirit so that we could fully experience his loving presence and share that experience with others along the way.

We do not see things as they are. We see things as we are

~ Rabbi Shemuel ben Nachmani, as quoted in the Talmudic tractate Berakhot (55b.)

When the Bible isn't "Biblical"

When the Bible Isn’t Biblical

Reflections on the Wesleyan Quadrilateral - Reason
September 1, 2024


Romans 12:2, Acts 17:11

see examples of problematic scriptures such as:
1 Samuel 15:1-3, Exodus 21:20-21, Ephesians 6:5-6

This is what the Lord of heavenly forces says: I am going to punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel: how they attacked the Israelites as they came up from Egypt.  So go! Attack the Amalekites; put everything that belongs to them under the ban. Spare no one. Kill men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and donkeys.”  

1 Samuel 15:2-3

Don’t be conformed to the patterns of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds so that you can figure out what God’s will is—what is good and pleasing and mature.

Romans 12:2

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When reading the passage above from 1 Samuel 15:3 about God commanding the slaughter of every man, woman, child and even infant among the Amalekites, one would think someone might pause to question whether this is actually what God desires.  It doesn’t exactly sound like the loving God we see in Jesus, or even the God of the Old Testament who brought his people out of slavery and walked with them even through the valleys of the shadow of death. 

Yet to my shock and horror, I actually sat in a church meeting where church leaders said that all Muslims should be killed before they kill us and mutilate our children, or at the very least be run out of our country.  I’ve heard pastors say that gay people should be locked up behind electric fences and separated from society.  And I’ve been personally told by a church member that he should beat me to a pulp until admitted that my stance against violence was foolish and that I must fight back if I wanted to live.  In each instance, they used passages like the one above to justify their positions.

Like the text in 1 Samuel, these are extreme examples and fortunately do not represent the majority of Christians.  Nevertheless, passages like this and other “God ordained” violence throughout scripture have been used time and time again to justify violence of every kind: “Holy  Wars”, oppression, slavery, and even genocide. 

Other texts have been misappropriated in different ways; to subjugate women both in the church and in the family and society, to elevate our nation to the status of “God’s chosen” or “The promised land” over and against every other nation, or to justify abuses of power and authority in the name of God’s will, among others. 

The point is simply this.  When we turn off the rational minds that God gave us and interpret scripture at face value with no consideration for context, history, trends and progressions, literary style, and any other number of factors, we can quickly assume that every verse is a prescriptive example or instruction for how to live in all times and all places.  Certainly there are such passages, such as the greatest commandment, to love God and neighbor.  But most reasonable people do not assume that passages about genocide, slavery or other forms of oppression are offering us universal principles for all times. 

We need reason to understand how to appropriately interpret and apply scripture to our lives and in our world and we need the Spirit to renew our minds so that we may discern with humility and wisdom.