Is War with Iraq the Judgment of God?

Is the war with Iraq a just war? No. And I say that unequivocally. Now I’m sure that I’ll be branded “un-American” or a “pacifist” by some, but any that know me know how ridiculous such charges are. I’m a gun-toting, true blue, God-fearing American. I’m also a preacher.

If America goes to war with Iraq, which it certainly seems is imminent, we could quite possibly be facing a spreading conflagration unseen since the days of the Big One, WWII. If this happens, America will be plunged into internal chaos the likes of which we have never seen.

I am not a prophet of doom. But I am a watchman. Just like in Ezekiel 33, I believe my responsibility to be to sound a warning when I see the judgment of God imminently coming. I have been sounding that warning for a number of years, mostly to a people that scoffs at the notion that God would bring judgment on America or the church. But if we go to war with Iraq we risk the possibility, yea the likelihood of ultimate defeat at several levels.

First, why would God bring judgment on America and on the church in America?

The question really should be “Why hasn’t He already?” America has ensconced in law the killing of pre-born human beings made in the Image of God. We have surgically slaughtered over 40 million children since the Roe v. Wade decision of 1973. We have slaughtered at least ten times that number of children through abortifacient birth control. As a nation, we protect child-killers and child-killing establishments with tax-funded police protection, and arrest Christians who speak out against it.

As a nation we have openly embraced the sin of homosexuality. This abomination which God's Word calls "filthy" and "perversion", our nation calls "an alternative lifestyle". We have overturned our laws that called this behavior a "crime against nature" and instead we arrest anyone who refuses to hire or rent to a person with such a filthy and wicked lifestyle. We arrest preachers who preach against it and call for repentance of sodomites and jail them for "hate speech".

We have made adultery and fornication the accepted norm, teaching masturbation and sexual technique to children in our tax-funded government school system. We have overturned our laws prohibiting this wickedness. We prosecute property owners who refuse to rent their apartments to fornicators. We have allowed divorce for any reason until we have half of all marriages ending up that way. We have become a moral cesspool as a nation. As a nation we have embraced virtually every wicked abomination that God hates. We have become an arrogant and power-hungry nation that has forgotten her roots; forgotten her forefathers and the principles they fought and died for, and the God they served. We have forgotten God. We have kicked him out of our courts and our schools and trampled His courts. We deserve whatever is coming. And it is coming.

Historically, God deals in two different ways with wayward children. Sometimes he allows drought and famine to increase until the people cry out in repentance to God for relief. Sometimes he allows the enemies of the nation to have military victory over them and bring them into bondage until they cry out in their distress and repent as a nation. Sometimes He does both. America was founded as a Christian nation. There is no question about that, in spite of some recent revisionist history  from God-hating heathens who attempt to expunge from the record the foundations of the nation. Every colony's original charter shows that these colonies were established to "propagate the Christian religion" and to preach "ye Gospel of Jesus Christ". The Mayflower Compact, The First Charter of Virginia, The Fundamental Orders of Connecticut, they are all there to read for yourself. The Supreme Court itself declared the United States to be a "Christian Nation" citing all the founding documents in the famous case Holy Trinity Church v. United States (1892).

We called ourselves after the Name of Christ, and then we rejected the Messiah that bought us. God still judges nations. While the New Covenant gives individuals the promise of redemption from hell by the blood of Christ, God still judges nations that turn from Him in apostacy. America has clearly done that.

What does all this have to do with Iraq?

As I wrote above, I believe our nation will attack Iraq unilaterally in a short period of time. This will be the first time in American history that we have attacked a nation that has not first attacked us. And regardless of the Presidential and Big Media assertions to the contrary, Iraq has not attacked us, and no link to the hijackers which destroyed the World Trade Center towers and the damaged Pentagon exists. But links to other nations are there with hard documentation, yet we leave them alone, even call them our friends. Behold excerpts from a recent WorldNetDaily article:

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=31007
Excerpt:

[CIA Director George] Tenet told members of the Senate Armed Services Committee the key link between Iraq and al-Qaida is an Osama bin Laden "collaborator", Abu Musab Zarqawi, who spent two months last summer receiving medical treatment in Baghdad. He said about two dozen of Zarqawi's followers remain in Baghdad and are members of Egyptian Islamic Jihad, a terrorist group that has merged with al-Qaida.

Although Iraq harbors this group, Tenet said he had no evidence suggesting Iraq has any operational control over it.

Meanwhile, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters this afternoon that the taped message purportedly of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden broadcast on al-Jazeera television yesterday offers new proof of "linkage."

"We have a exhortation from Osama bin Laden on this tape to people inside Iraq as he calls them, the mujahedin brotherhood or brothers ... 'to roll up their sleeves and prepare for jihad.' And he said, 'It will not hurt under these circumstances that the interest of Muslims would meet with the socialist in fighting the crusaders.' The socialist he refers to is Saddam Hussein. ... That is linkage," Fleischer said.

This is their strongest evidence of "proof" that Iraq is involved with the attacks in DC and on the World Trade Center. THAT'S ALL THERE IS! The KEY link is that a "bin Laden collaborator" (what exactly does that mean? What has he done? What is the connection?)  got medical treatment in Baghdad! Getting medical treatment in Iraq is now proof that Saddam was responsible for Sept. 11! Even though, as Tenet admitted, there is "no evidence suggesting Iraq has any operational control over"  this collaborator or any of his followers.

Honestly, is this enough to start unilaterally bombing a country? Is this a "definite link" between Iraq and the group that killed thousands of Americans?

BUT WAIT! There IS a definite link to the actual people who hijacked planes and flew them into our tallest buildings. Fifteen of the 19 hijackers were Saudi Arabian nationals. You remember Saudi Arabia, right? Our ALLY. We launched the Gulf War from our military bases in Saudi Arabia. We have huge oil contracts with Saudi Arabia (oil that we ourselves using our equipment, technology and manpower discovered and extracted from the ground). Yes, 15 of the hijackers were Saudis. Now there's a direct connection, right? BUT WAIT. There's MORE. You might argue that the Saudi Royal Family or government had nothing to do with this, but you would be wrong! Although it has not been widely reported (and was voted the "most spiked story" of 2002), it seems that Princess Haifa bint Faisal, the daughter of the late King Faisal and wife of Saudi envoy Prince Bandar, donated money to an al-Qaida controlled "charity" and that money went directly into the hands of the Sept 11th hijackers!

Now, let us summarize. Saddam Hussein, whose military capabilities according to US and UN sources were 90% destroyed during the Gulf War is an imminent threat who must be attacked preemptively. He has no nuclear devices. He may have some biological weapons, but has no delivery system for them. His conventional weapons, missiles, tanks, planes, etc. were virtually decimated in the Gulf War. But he MUST be stopped and removed from power, even at the cost of American blood. He harbors the terrorists that destroyed the Twin Towers, therefore we are justified in "retaliating". We know this because Osama bin Laden said that it was convenient that he and the "infidel" Hussein had "the same goal" concerning "the crusaders". We also know this because a mysterious al-Qaida "collaborator" spent two months in Baghdad having surgery. THAT is "linkage"

Saudi Arabia is our friend and ally. We know this because we get lots of oil from them at exorbitant prices, even though we discovered it in the first place. We also know this because they let us have an airbase there. Well, yes, 15 of the hijackers was Saudi Arabian; and of course bin Laden himself is Saudi Arabian; and the Princess funded the hijackers out of her own pocket through a front group... but they are still our friends. We don't see any linkage here. We see no problem that warrants disturbing our oil and military arrangements with them.

By What Authority Do We Wage Preemptive War?

Some will say, well, Sept 11th aside, the only reason we didn't conquer Saddam 12 years ago, was that he sued for peace and agreed to UN inspections and to completely disarm and destroy his chemical and biological weapons. Since he has not, and has proven to be hiding things, he should be militarily excised by the authority of the original war.

What was the authority of the Gulf War? Did the United States Congress, as required by law, declare war against Iraq? No. A coalition of 34 nations under resolutions passed by the United Nations Security Council gave authorization for that war. It was not a U.S. war, it was a U.N. war.

President Bush has declared that he will unilaterally attack Iraq whether he has United Nations support or not. He declares that he has Constitutional authority because a resolution was passed just after Sept 11 gave the President authority to use "whatever means necessary" to fight the new "War on Terror". Terrorists are not a nation, the Congress reasoned, so you cannot declare war on a "group" that may present in many nations. But now, President Bush is taking that mandate and attacking a sovereign nation without the legal mandate of a declaration of war.

President Bush had two authorities by which he could claim a "legitimate" right to attack Iraq. First, he could seek a Declaration of War against Iraq from the Congress of the United States. Second, He could appeal to the United Nations Security Council which authorized the first war. He has not been given the authority by either one. Now, I would argue that the United Nations is not a legitimate authority to wage war in the first place, and we have no business allowing the U.N. to usurp our sovereignty in matters of war or anything else. But President George H.W. Bush did, and therefore bound the nation to that agreement concerning Iraq. President Bush II is not being given permission to prosecute that war by the authority that authorized it in the first place. Second, Congress has not issued a declaration of war against Iraq either. I'm sure they don't want to, as everyone wants to distance themselves if things go wrong. But that is what is required legally for us to attack Iraq.

Neither of those requirements has been met.

The Consequences of War with Iraq

I have no doubt that Iraq will be easy to defeat militarily. But they are not the only ones involved here. U.S. intelligence agencies have estimated that as many as 5,000 al Qaeda members may be operating inside the United States. And that is just al Qaida. Other sources estimate up to 2,000 terrorist "sleeper cells" exist on U.S. soil. In a long-term plan they have come here, some legally, some illegally. They have taken jobs, sometimes in potentially strategic places like electric power plants, telephone and water facilities and even military installations. They have been patiently waiting and planning and biding their time. The thing is, these people don't even care if they are killed. Their martyrdom just adds to the glory they think they'll have in the Next Life. Unfortunately, they don't realize how incredibly hot it's going to be when they get there!

In addition, there are known plans to attack Israel as soon as we begin the attack on Iraq. There will be a massive effort by the Palestine Liberation Organization and its allies to take advantage of the US preoccupation with Iraq to rid the world of the state of Israel. We will be drawn into that as well. As we write, communist North Korea has nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them, and is threatening the United States with using them! Right NOW! Yet, President Bush still insists that North Korea is not a threat, but Iraq is. The Chinese have also been known to entertain a plan to attack Taiwan, our faithful ally of over 50 years, should we become embroiled in a full scale war. Our friends in Taiwan will be asking for our help to defend against the Chinese.

Meanwhile, we are being told by our own government to "stock up on duct tape and plastic sheeting" in case of biological or chemical attack. We are being advised to stock up at least three days of supplies of food, water, batteries, candles, etc. in case there are interruptions of power or water supply. We are on Code Orange Alert, second only to Code Red. This could get very ugly.

And if the worst case scenario happens, we will deserve it, for all of the reasons stated at the beginning of this article. I do not know if this is what God will use to chastise America for her wickedness and apostacy. But I sound the warning here and now. We need to be on our knees in repentance before God. We need to turn from our apathy. We need to rebuke and expose wickedness and take a stand for righteousness. If we do not, we will be the bondslaves of another nation, our capacity to raise our own food decimated by drought and war, and that condition will persist until we, as a nation, repent before a holy and jealous God, and restore our law and our culture to a standard consistent with His Holy Word.

May God have mercy on us. May the people of our nation find a place of repentance.

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