Years ago the nightly news featured a woman who wanted to sue the government.  She had enlisted in the Army Reserves and ended up being sent to a hazardous area.  “When I joined the military,” she said, “Nobody ever told me I might be sent to war.”  

The incredulous interviewer asked, “Why did you join the military to begin with?”

The girl answered without blinking, “So I could get college money.”

Amazing.  Even if the recruiter lied to her, it must have crossed her mind while she was learning to throw hand grenades and firing an M-60 machine gun that there just might be something more than school books in her future.

When we expect the Christian life to indefinitely hum along, relaxed, light, and inspiring, but forget that Scripture compares us to soldiers (2 Tim. 2:3), sooner or later disillusionment is bound to occur.  

Something happens.  Trouble in the church.  Resistance.  Persecution.  A major disappointment.  Relational friction.  Temptation.  

You might be rattled to discover that when you believed in Jesus and entered His church, you actually signed up for the struggle of the ages. 

The good news is that Jesus promised victory.

He said, “I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matt. 16:18).

You can’t miss the struggle implied in these words, where one thing is attempting to prevail against the other–the gates of hell versus the church.  From the horizontal point of view, it is the influence of darkness versus that rag-tag group of folks who for twenty centuries have confessed the name of Jesus.

I don’t deny that the historic church has often been on the defensive.  And, according to Ephesians 6, the weapons of our warfare are often for our protection–helmet, shield, breastplate, etc.  But, does Matthew 16:18 really  portray the church as a turtle, hunkered down within its shell?    

Consider for a moment what happened during Roman siege warfare.  A city would lock itself down against invasion, but the Romans had specialized weapons like towers, catapults, wheeled galleys, and hand cranked cross-bows.  

The best case scenario for invaders would be to breach the city gates.  Those gates had to hold, or all would be lost.  They were defensive in nature, and would prevail only by keeping the attacking army out.

Remember Jesus said “the gates of hell would not prevail” against the church.  That implies the forces of darkness are on the defensive, not primarily the church.  It also suggests that the church is not some passive entity that sits in the corner, just hoping to survive whatever beating the world gives it.  Paul said to the Corinthians, “the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ, (2 Cor. 10:4-5)

The point is, we’re supposed to be proactive, like an army winning decisive victories on behalf of men’s souls, blessing them, and spiritually enriching them.  We will never flourish as a mere occupation force.  Armies that have won stunning victories only to become landlords have historically found themselves to be little more than targets.  Morale drains away.  The occupation force forgets why it started occupying a place to begin with.

We believers need to beware that we don’t slip into an exclusively defensive mindset.  It’s an easy thing to do.  I tell myself I don’t want any trouble, live and let live, mind your own business, etc., etc.

I continue to reason:  Let’s leave missions–foreign or domestic–to radical evangelists.  I just want a place to attend on Sunday, so I can enjoy my life with my spouse, my well-behaved children, and my dog that doesn’t shed.  In the meantime, I’ll do my best to keep out the bad stuff.  Till Jesus comes, amen.

No.

We were called to both advance the gospel, and advance into it.  Along the way, we free the people around us from spiritual darkness.  Simultaneously, we ourselves enter, explore, and possess the unsearchable riches of Christ, growing higher and deeper.  That means a lot of hellish gates and gate guards being overwhelmed.  Only divine power can demolish such hellish resistance.     

Oh, and a bunch of rag-tag people who are clear about what they’ve joined.