Gun’s Don’t Kill People
Do you remember the bumper stickers and slogan that was going around a few years ago? “Gun’s don’t kill people; people kill people.” I don’t know why that was brought back to mind this week. I was walking around in a neighborhood delivering bags for the Hallows Eve Diversion (shameless plug!) and it came back to me. I loved the controversy people made around the phrase. I mean think about it, truly a gun in itself doesn’t kill a person. It takes the intent or heart of one person to pick up the instrument, pick a target and pull the trigger. To shoot a person, it takes a person. Now gun’s have been known to randomly go off on their own…but even then it is because someone first messed with it. To harm someone with a gun, first there must be a person who has decided to pick up and use the gun. (Whether in a fit of passion or in a pre-meditated condition)
The gun itself is just a tool. HOWEVER, the gun is THE tool. The reason people fight so hard for gun control is because to kill someone with a gun is a whole lot easier than to kill with any other instrument. People kill people…but often the instrument of choice is a gun.
I want to submit to you that at the heart of the fight against poverty and injustice, this same concept is true. You see, I believe that there is a God who looks at poverty and injustice and says “This should not be.” I think He cares for all who suffer in this world. Truly, I think where any person sits in suffering, the God of Heaven sees and is filled with compassion. When He sees brokenness in our world, He desires to create wholeness.
In the gun situation, it is true…people kill people. In the same regard, when it comes to poverty and injustice, God is the one who fights hardest and desires to end these social ills. What many people fail to realize is we are like the gun. A person may have it in their heart to kill, but the action doesn’t take place until the instrument is in use, serving the purpose of the person holding it. Our God has it in His heart to fight against poverty, to fight against human trafficking, to not allow injustice to continue. While that is true, there is a chosen instrument that God likes to use to fight these things. We, the people on this earth, are the chosen instruments God wants to use.
Gun’s don’t kill people, people kill people.
Poverty and Injustice don’t just stop because God wants it to, God stirs us to action, and we become His chosen tool for change.
October 29, 2008 at 1:33 pm
So we are Gods guns and God has picked us up and pointed us and pulled the trigger. It is then on our shoulders to hear Him and to act on what he has called us to. So we need to place and create more of “Gods guns” in areas with poverty and injustice to allow God to stir us to action.
- He said to me, “Son of man, stand up on your feet and I will speak to you.” As he spoke, the Spirit came into me and raised me to my feet, and I heard him speaking to me. -Ezekiel 2:1-2
October 29, 2008 at 6:16 pm
This is good and true… And let’s not forget we have to be loaded to make any difference… If we don’t have bullets (ie: compassion, etc… all from God), just pulling the trigger won’t work. We have to be filled up to pour out.
Well written.