Defend

Defend

The dictionary defines Defend as "to ward off attack from; guard against assault or injury".

In Luke 10:25-37 (go read), we have the story of the "Good Samaritan". A Jew was beaten, robbed, and left for dead in a ditch. A priest (preacher) came by and saw him and went on other side of the road. A Levite(religious servant) came by too and saw him and went on the other side of the road. Finally, a Samaritan (an emeny of the jews, jews looked down on them) came along, saw him, had compassion on him, helped him, and took care of Him.

Now the parable Jesus told was about "who is my neighbor?" and Jesus was saying everyone is our neighbor. We are to love everyone. God first, then others. However, I want to go a step farther. I think we as Christians have an obligation to stand up for those who are helpless, hurting, in need, and have been wronged. We should not only be "Defenders" of the faith", but "defenders" of those who are wronged.

Love this scripture in Proverbs:

Proverbs 31:8-9 (NIV)

8 “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. 9 Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy.”

Unfortunately, we live in a society today that "doesn't want to cause a scene", or "doesn't want to get involved". We love to look the other way, or think it will just go away eventually. People don't want to stand up for what is right or for people who have been wronged because it's "Uncomfortable" sometimes it involves someone they care about, so, It's easier to ignore the problem, or let it go, or pretend nothing happened, or how it all works out on it's own.

My wife and I both in our pasts have been hurt at the hands of other people. I am sure some of you reading this have to, we all probably have in different times and ways been hurt or wronged by people. It seems the people who should care the most to defend you or come to your aid don't. People will tell you to your face how awful it is what you endured or went through and how wrong it was, but when they are faced with the problem or the person that hurt you, 99.9% of the time, they do or say nothing. I'm not sure what hurts worse? You may also think, well if you've been hurt, you just need to get over it and move on, sometimes it's not that easy, especially when you don't have the proper support.

Now, I'm not suggesting we take matters into our own hands or seek revenge because justice and vengence is for the Lord(Romans 12:19). I'm not saying if someone hurts your kid to go hurt them back, or someone is mean to your sister to go beat them up. What I am suggesting is that we defend those who cannot defend themselves. What I'm saying is that we don't look the other way, pretend nothing is wrong, or allow the person who is wrong to go around pretending they did nothing wrong or contribute to their delusion.

Many times, people who do wrong, won't accept or admit their wrong, and they go around acting as if they did nothing wrong, and the problem is when we see them and we allow them to act that way, by being nice or acting like nothing is wrong. This just encourges them to keep living this lie or justifies their actions even more. Does that make sense?

There are too many people walking around free in this world living their lives of lies. They are evil, mean, wrong, or need help and either in deep denial or simply don't care how they treat others. They bully, abuse, betray, treat others wrong or bad, and if people don't stand up to them, or defend those they are hurting, how does the cycle ever break?

We can pray for God to convict them, and we can pray for God to deal with them and bring justice and avenge the wrongs, but I also think as Christians we have an obligation to defend our own. Not with physical violence or revenge, but with simple standing up, taking notice, not looking the other way, and not being "fake" nice. Jesus didn't mince words with the pharisee's when they were being hypocrites and Apostle Paul didn't sugar-coat His words when dealing with sinful people in the church.

People want to think being a Christian means being nice all the time. We are in spiritual warfare. Satan is on constant attack, we have to be on constant alert. Satan uses people to hurt people. We have the power of God within us at our disposal. God wants to use us to defend His church, His people, and ourselves with His power at work in us. Sometimes that means being uncomfortable, having uncomfortable conversations, confronting someone, or standing up to defend someone. Being a Christian isn't always nice ,cozy, & sunday morning smiles. Sometimes it's confronting sin, standing up for right, and defending wrongs.

If you have family members or friends or church members who have been wronged or hurt by others, then support them, care about them, and do so by defending and not allowing the hurt to continue or to be made worse. Nothing worse than salt in a wound. If you are confronted with the person who hurt your loved one or friend, you don't have to punch them, or kick them, or cause a scene, but you can avoid them, and if you can't avoid them, you can let them know with body language or words, that you know what they did, you don't appreciate it, and you aren't just going to act like everything is ok or let them get by with pretending they didn't hurt someone. I hope that makes sense? I'm not promoting conflict, or revenge, but I am promoting standing up for what is right, defending those wronged, and ending the cycle of silent approval.

Most of all if you have been wronged, you can forgive the person even if they don't admit doing anything wrong, and you can pray for them to repent, but also for God to bring justice. Prayer is the best thing we all can do.