Bin Laden is Dead; Should Good Christians Rejoice?

I heard the news Monday evening in Taiwan (Monday morning in the US): Osama bin Laden has been killed. At first I was not sure whether to believe it or not, but it seems to be true. Pictures today show rejoicing at ground zero in New York and elsewhere. Twitter and Facebook is showing plenty of activity around this topic. Should we be happy? Is it okay to celebrate?

Of course we are human. We don't always feel what we should feel. We are not really disgusted with sin, especially when it is our own and even when we know it is sin. Sometimes we don't even admit that it is. We often don't praise righteousness, even when we know we should, and sometimes we don't even see what is right. So, as I muse on this here, keep in mind, I'm not talking about what we all might feel. I'm talking more about how we should feel and think if we we had the mind of God. Of course, even here, there is a huge danger of false pride since I certainly don't have the heart or mind of God. I should be the last to speak on that topic.

But, at the same time, it does bear thinking about since we should be seeking the heart of God even as we admit that we are light years away from it.

Maybe we should first ask, "Is God happy?" The question seems almost silly, and maybe it is, but for the sake of discussion, let's go there. Is God glad that the US took out such a notorious mass murderer. The answer is right at the heart of the gospel and in the Bible verse that is usually the first one that we memorize. "For God so loved the world that He gave his only Son...." Does that include bin Laden? I think it's pretty clear that it has to include him if we want to take the Bible seriously.

Some have quoted Ezekiel 33:11 as well: "...As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live...."

At the same time, Psalms 5:4-6 says "

For you are not a God who is pleased with wickedness;
with you, evil people are not welcome.
The arrogant cannot stand
in your presence.
You hate all who do wrong;
you destroy those who tell lies.
The bloodthirsty and deceitful
you, LORD, detest."

There are many things that language is not really good at expressing and the heart of an infinite God is certainly at the top. However, I don't think that God is happy that bin Laden is dead, at least not the kind of "happy" that I see on TV. If we believe the verses above, I believe that he weeps over one of His creatures, one of His beloved, who was so thoroughly blinded by evil that he saw no problem with mass slaughter and felt no remorse afterwards.

But, at the same time, I also believe that God detested bin Laden for what he did. He was gracious, patient, longsuffering, and not willing for bin Laden to perish. But, in the end, He looked at this death with something indescribable (as most really deep emotions are) that included pain along with satisfaction--but no words are really adequate.

But, I also don't think it was the giddy kind of joy that we are seeing on the news. It isn't celebration. It's something else that I don't know how to describe even if I knew that I really understood. I think that the closest might be that of the mother who watches her son executed for multiple murders. Even if she agreed that it was just, she couldn't possibly be happy. One can hardly imagine the mixed emotions but also the overwhelming pain.

I think that it should give us pause to reflect. Our feelings might be swayed by patriotism, by pride, by the desire for vengeance, or a multitude of other things. Some people might be swayed in the other direction by a sense of pity or even by a view that America has mistreated Muslims and bin Laden was their defender. But, we should remember that salvation is by grace, not because we deserved anything. This isn't a defense of either bin Laden or of America. It is to say that, while it is natural to be glad that a mass murderer will kill no more, I also don't deserve God's grace any more than he did. I think I'm better than bin Laden. At least I haven't killed thousands of people and spread hatred on that scale. But, I am still wholly unworthy to be accepted into the presence of a holy God. It should push us to fall back on his grace.

But, there is one part of this story where we Christians do bear some of the blame. Most of the world, and especially the Muslim world, doesn't have a real testimony of the gospel. I remember once when I spoke to a church group about Taiwan and someone said, "Well, if they hear the gospel once and don't believe, then they deserve to go to hell. Why waste your time on people who don't want to know God." Does God love an Iranian as much as he loves an American? Does he love a Chinese as much as a Guatemalan? Does He love Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus? Why do we want God to be longsuffering with old Uncle Jeremiah and not with Mr. Khalid or Mrs. Chang?

Where is our passion for the world (the people) that God loves? We were created to be with God, to not only glorify him but to be a part of his glory. Man was offered the tree of life in the garden, but when he choose to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil instead, the tree of life was taken away--or a better description may be that man was taken away from it. But, the offer is still there to those who are willing to forsake their sin, to repent and cast themselves at His feet. That is what God offers to us--eternal life with Him, sharing in His sovereignty and His glory, and it painsHhim that anyone not receive it.

C.S. Lewis preached a sermon on this called "The Weight of Glory." He notes that we were created for something that we can hardly even imagine in this world, the participation in God's rule over the universe and a share of his glory. Lewis even uses the terms "gods and godesses" to describe and emphasize the enormity the role that God is preparing for us. He writes:

"It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deeply about that of his neighbour. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbour’s glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours."

We can all point to people who fit into the category of "horrors" as Lewis describes--Hitler, Stalin, bin Laden, and interestingly, Lewis published this sermon first in late 1941 when it looked as if Hitler were about to conquer all of Europe. I wonder if he had Hitler in mind, or maybe Stalin. What makes them all the more horrible, however, is not just the gravity of what they have done, but the loss of what they were created to be. And yet, they are dead. It is too late for them. God will be their judge. They should remind us that while we may feel some sense of justice and maybe even satisfaction with the death of a terrorist, we must also be grieving at the loss of the same human, created by God and precious to Him--so precious that He gave His only Son for this person.

But, it should also remind us of the living--those around us who have not yet reached that great divide. What Lewis reminds us of goes to the core of the gospel. The people we see every day, whether on the news or face to face, were created to be everlasting splendors but have the potential to be eternal horrors. What we most often notice are those who are further along to one or the other of these extremes, but all will be one or the other and the lubrication of our sin natures makes the slope toward "eternal horror" much slipperier. But, there is no one who can't be saved while there is also no one who deserves to be saved. How can we ignore those who are objects of God's love? What are we doing to turn them to Him? How can we say that we deserve his salvation more than another?

Lewis goes on to say:

"And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner—no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment."

While I certainly understand the sense of gladness that such a murderer has now finally been brought to justice (and feel it myself), this doesn't make the world all right. It's still a sinful world and there are plenty like him to some extent. We can't rejoice and we can't relax in this victory.

Instead of celebration, it should bring a sense of sadness at the degradation and corruption that sin has wrought. It should also drive us to love the world as God did--that He gave His only Son. And, if we could do that, what would it drive us to do? It drove Christ to humble Himself as a servant and even to a humiliating death on the cross. It drove him to take action. What does it do for you?