Stay in Your Lane

When politicians veer into my lane--especially when they do so misusing scripture--I can't just NOT say something.

Recently, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) reported receiving more than 200 complaints from service members across multiple branches of the U.S. military. According to those complaints, some commanders have been invoking extremist Christian rhetoric—specifically referencing the Book of Revelation and biblical “end times”—to justify possible military involvement in the war with Iran.

Nope. Just no.

Christians (and frankly, all people) should be deeply disturbed whenever the Bible is used to frame war as part of God’s plan.

The Book of Revelation has always been one of the most misunderstood books in the Bible. Filled with vivid imagery—beasts, dragons, bowls full of God's wrath, cosmic battles—you can see how people might treat it like a road map to the end times.

Revelation was written to Christians living under the oppressive rule of the Roman Empire. They were marginalized, persecuted, and often killed for their faith. The book’s dramatic imagery wasn’t meant to guide military strategy or predict geopolitical events thousands of years in the future.

It was meant to give hope.

Hope that oppressive empires do not have the final word.
Hope that violence does not win in the end.
Hope that God sees the suffering of the faithful and will ultimately set things right.

In other words, Revelation wasn’t written to inspire people to bring about Armageddon. It was written to remind suffering believers that God would one day overcome the violence of empire. (A message we could all use right about now.)

Unfortunately, throughout history, powerful people have repeatedly twisted the Bible (often invoking Revelation) to justify war.

During the Crusades, biblical imagery was used to rally Christians to conquer Jerusalem.
During the Civil War, both North and South claimed divine backing for their cause.
During the Cold War, nuclear conflict was often framed in apocalyptic terms.
And for decades, Christian nationalists and fundamentalists have tied Middle East conflict to predictions about the end times.

Powerful people do love to claim that God is on their side--especially when it comes to war.

But nothing of what I know of Jesus backs up that claim.

When violence erupted around him, Jesus didn’t escalate it. When one of his disciples pulled out a sword to defend him, Jesus told him to put it away. The kingdom of God, he insisted, does not come through force.

Jesus consistently resisted the idea that God’s purposes advance through violence.

And the Book of Revelation—despite all its frightening imagery—doesn’t end with humanity winning a cosmic war.

It ends with healing.

In the final chapters of the book, the vision shifts away from battlefields and toward restoration. A city descends from heaven. A river flows through it. And on either side of that river grows the tree of life.

Its leaves, we are told, are for the healing of the nations.

Not their destruction.

Not their conquest.

Their healing.

Whenever Scripture is used to frame war as God’s will—or worse, as a step toward the end of the world—we can be sure that the Gospel has been lost in translation.

Scripture should never be used to make war feel holy.

And Christians should never be

If anything, the Bible consistently calls us toward a different role altogether.

Blessed are the peacemakers.

Not the warmakers.
Not the empire builders.
Not the people trying to hurry history toward Armageddon.

The peacemakers.

Not eager participants in another land's apocalypse.