The Centurion Law Enforcement Ministry Newsletter
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Updated 01/26/2019
Greetings to all our fellow officers,
sheepdogs and supporters!
As stated, I'm experimenting with a new template for the newsletter with the hope that I can simplify things a bit and make it easier to read on your phones (I generally use my laptop, but it seems that somehow makes me "old") while still keeping you informed and challenged. Let me know what you think!
This week's Bible study puts a front sight focus not only on Christ our Captain (as always) but also on our war against
evil (wickedness, sin, lawlessness, etc.). A war? Absolutely (and it is getting worse)! The problem of evil is particularly front and center in our country today in terms of our own government, which of course includes our God-ordained profession of law enforcement. So how should we respond? Scroll down to the study to discover God's "prescription" in a message I've entitled,
"Cops at War" (Battling Evil on Two Fronts)
.
Miss an issue? Here again is last week's --
Doing the Right Thing. As always, I post past editions on our social media feeds (buttons below) and on our
website as well.
Finally, take the time to review the resources, prayer requests and upcoming events I've posted for you below.
Once again folks, let's "
Run to the Battle" and "
take the hill" (Bro. Jim Bontrager's line) behind Christ our Captain!
MC
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RESOURCES
PRAYER REQUESTS
(1) Please begin to pray for our
FCPO Police Week team
as we begin planning and gearing up for our
Police Week 2019
outreach to our own in DC.
(2) Pray for a fellow officer (Ted) who lost his adult son (as parents, we hope that we never have to bury a child).
(3) As we
battle evil
on multiple fronts, pray for our government leaders (repentance, salvation, transformation).
(4) Prayers are needed for badly injured Rio Grande County (CO) Dep.
Michael Pino
and his family. God knows the details...please pray.
Have a prayer request or announcement you would like included here? Need help/prayer?
Email me
! I also post prayer requests on
my personal Facebook page
("friend" and message me).
UPCOMING EVENTS
(2) Time to start getting the word out about the
2019 Breaching the Barricade/Officer Appreciation Day
events (October 18-19 in northern Indiana). Incredible training for cops and a "bucket list" event for officers and their families. Mark your calendars and plan on joining us in Indiana in October, and pray for
Jim Bontrager
and his team...the effort is massive and the challenges overwhelming ("but God").
(4) Minister and retired officer Jimmy Meeks of
Sheepdog Seminars
(also highly recommended) is starting a new outreach specifically for police officers:
New Covenant Cops
.
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Cops at War!
We are in an all out war against evil on two fronts! Here's how God would have us FIGHT!
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While I've shared and taught on this passage of Scripture (the "
Armor of God
") many times, I am pressed to share a Bible study that also hits on the very real fact that we're in an all out
WAR against evil
on two fronts: the physical (police/military) AND the spiritual. So how does God want us to respond to the problem of evil? Let's open our Bibles and dig in!
Let me start by saying that yes, we (cops) face down physical evil on a daily basis. But it is also vitally important that we understand who and what is behind it on a spiritual level.
Broadly stated, the “problem of evil” is the seeming contradiction between an all-powerful, all-loving God and the human experience of suffering, evil and wickedness in the world. Critics (backed by our common enemy, mind you) claim that the existence of evil is proof that the
omnipotent
,
omnibenevolent
God of the Bible cannot exist. Since “
bad things happen to good people
,” critics (unbelievers) say, God is either nonexistent or less good and less powerful than Scripture "suggests" (generally speaking, nothing in God's Word is a "suggestion").
Despite what these critics would have you believe, the “problem of evil” is not something God leaves unaddressed. Scripture -- God's wholly (and holy) inerrant Word -- not only refers to the problem of evil and warfare, but it offers "tactical battle plans" for victory!
According to the God in His Word, the very real issue of evil is something He both understands and acknowledges. Moreover, God’s willingness to grant us the freedom of making our own choices allows for the reality of moral evil which in turn leads to physical evil. Even so, God has always acted to soften the blows that evil and suffering land on humanity. He also provided the one and only means to make all wrongs right (to wit, ultimate, overwhelming victory). Praise God, we can rest in the assurance that His plan to defeat and destroy evil will one day be fully complete.
Scripture acknowledges the “problem of evil”
Many of the Bible’s 66 individual books openly express what we could rightly term the “problem of evil.” Let's look at just a few passages that address this issue:
The entire
book of Job
is a discussion of the reasons why mankind experiences suffering even when we don’t seem to deserve it. In addition, Scripture offers many other notable passages that clearly reflect the problem of evil, including but by no means limited to:
Habakkuk 1:2–4
, “
How long, Lord, must I call for help, but you do not listen? Or cry out to you, ‘Violence!’ but you do not save? Why do you make me look at injustice? Why do you tolerate wrongdoing? Destruction and violence are before me; there is strife, and conflict abounds. Therefore the law is paralyzed, and justice never prevails. The wicked hem in the righteous, so that justice is perverted
.”
Ecclesiastes 4:1–3
, “
Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun: I saw the tears of the oppressed—and they have no comforter; power was on the side of their oppressors—and they have no comforter. And I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living, who are still alive. But better than both is the one who has never been born, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun
.”
Psalm 10:1
, “
Why, Lord, do you stand far off? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?
”
Psalm 22:1–2
, “
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, but I find no rest
.” (Yes, Jesus Himself quotes v. 1 from the cross in
Matthew 27:46
and
Mark 15:34
)
Psalm 83:1–2
, “
O God, do not remain silent; do not turn a deaf ear, do not stand aloof, O God. See how your enemies growl, how your foes rear their heads
.”
These passages show a personal, deep awareness of the reality of evil. Scripture does not present evil as an abstraction or a remote idea. The real human beings who recorded the words of the Bible under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit were painfully aware of the existence of evil and suffering. And they were willing to express their feelings to God, especially when they felt He wasn’t acting according to their expectations.
Scripture frames the “problem of evil”
The Bible makes it clear that evil is neither something God intended nor created. Rather, moral evil is a necessary possibility. If we are truly free, then we are free to choose something other than God’s will—that is, we can choose moral evil. Scripture points out that there are consequences for defying the will of God—personal, communal, physical, and spiritual.
Genesis 2:16–17
, “
And the Lord God commanded the man, ‘You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die
.’“
Genesis 3:17–19
, “
To Adam he said, ‘Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat food from it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return
.”
Proverbs 14:34
, “
Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin condemns any people
.”
Romans 1:18–28
, “
The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. . . . Just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done
.”
Romans 3:23
, “
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God
.” (yes, that most certainly includes those of us serving in law enforcement).
Romans 5:12
, “
Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned.”
Hebrews 2:2–3
, “
For since the message spoken through angels was binding, and every violation and disobedience received its just punishment, how shall we escape if we ignore so great a salvation?
”
Taken together, Scripture shows us that physical evils—crime, sickness, abortion (murder), famine, war, and death—are the result of moral evil. And moral evil is something human beings are all responsible for on both a personal and a communal level. We suffer because of our own sins at times. Other times, we suffer because of the sins of others. In some situations, we suffer from simple cause-and-effect. And we sometimes suffer for a special purpose in order to bring hope or help—or a warning—to others (see
2 Corinthians 1:4
).
Through His Word, God “frames” the problem of evil by keeping it in the proper context. “Evil” is meaningless without something to compare it to. For comparison, we have the original creation of God, called “
very good
” (
Genesis 1:31
). We have the standard of goodness in God Himself. And we have an explanation for the various causes of evil and suffering.
Likewise, we see that this physical world is not all there is. Nor is this mortal life all we have been made for. We can experience physical struggles such as grief ("mournng") and “persecution” (
Matthew 5:4
,
11
) while looking to a greater, more permanent state of being “blessed.”
Of course, clearly framing what evil is and why we experience it is not the same as resolving the problem of evil. However, even the framing of evil in the context of a Christian (biblical) worldview shows that our experience of evil and suffering is not incompatible with God’s existence. Amplifying this proof is how the Bible goes beyond accurately describing evil to revealing God’s action (His
Battle Plan
) to remedy it.
Scripture opposes the “problem of evil”
Scripture shows that God did not create evil and does not promote it; rather, it describes God’s actions to
combat
it. God limits the impact of evil, warns us of the dangers of evil, acts to stop the spread of evil, gives us an escape from evil, and will eventually defeat evil forever.
Genesis 6:5–8
, “
The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. So the Lord said, ‘I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.’ But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord
.”
Genesis 7:1–4
, “
The Lord then said to Noah, ‘Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. . . . Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made
.’“
Deuteronomy 30:15–18
, “
See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess. But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess
.”
1 Corinthians 6:9–11
, “
Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God
.”
Revelation 19:11
, “
I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and wages war
.”
The Bible explains that God has acted to limit the impact of evil. He has given us clear instructions to avoid being evil. God has also made spiritual power available for those who want to be freed from the power of evil. And, from the very beginning, God set in motion a plan to make all wrongs right and end our experience of evil and suffering (see
Genesis 3:15
).
Taken as a whole, the Bible describes evil as something God has allowed, but never condoned, for the sake of our free will. All through history, God has taken steps to limit the influence of evil. And, most importantly, God Himself took the consequences of our sin, so every person can have access to forgiveness and salvation. As a result, all sin, evil, and suffering will someday be completely ended. Beyond the philosophical or theological aspects of this issue, Scripture in and of itself goes a long way to neutralizing the power of the “problem of evil.”
Scripture teaches that we are to do BATTLE (fight) against evil
God instructs us to FIGHT (battle) against evil. As cops, we take our "commission" and marching orders in
Romans 13:1-14,
The paraphrase I have on our Centurion gear is this:
COPS: God's ministers for good and a terror against evil.
" He adds to this in the books of Isaiah and Psalms (among others):
Isaiah 1:17,
l
earn to do good; seek justice,
correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause.
Psalm 82:3-4
Give justice to the weak and the fatherless; maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.”
And then He teaches us how to fight against the spiritual forces of darkness in
Ephesians 6:10-18,
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.
For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,
praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance
Part of the application for us in this passage is that we are to STAND against evil, that we are to never take off our armor and that we are not to sheath our sword (the Word of God)!
In the physical, natural world, our call as peace officers -- God's real life servant-warriors called to be a terror against evil -- is to stay physically fit (training), put on our body armor and physically fight against the ever-growing evil and wickedness in our sin-soaked world (exactly what we do as cops -- thus the title of this message, "
Cops at War
"). The key to being successful in this kind of warfare is to
train
(we MUST train), fight and serve under the command of our one true Commander-in-Chief and ultimate servant-warrior, the Lord Jesus Christ (
Exodus 15:3
). Yes,
even though we serve in a secular world, God has given believers (those who have been "born again" in Him -- see below) the Holy Spirit to guide, encourage, empower and protect us. Do you have that?
At the same time, it is vital that we understand that this physical warfare is directly tied to the spiritual realm under what is ultimately the temporary control of the "god of this world" (
2 Corinthians 4:4
) - Satan himself. And how should we fight against him? Jesus modeled it for us in
Matthew 4:1-11
as He uses His sword -- the Word of God -- to counter our common enemy!
Brethren, we are in fact "at war" against evil both as cops and Christians in general. As we can clearly see by answering our calls or simply turning on the news, this is a war that is rapidly growing in ferocity. In the natural world, we counter this by training hard, exercising sound officer safety, knowing our statutes and policies, and taking a righteous, proactive stand against evil and lawlessness (thus "law enforcement").
Likewise, the spiritual war against a fierce, determined and vicious (but ultimately defeated) enemy -- the devil and his evil minions (demonic forces) -- requires that we stay armored up and continually training in the Word (Bible study -- like this one) prayer and
iron sharpens iron
fellowship (backup) with other believers!
Finally, understand that we can only defeat evil if we are first "in Christ" (a Christian as only God can define it). Is that you? Have you surrendered in faith to Christ as your Lord and Savior? Are you sure? If not, read on!
(1) Still think you can "earn" or otherwise "badge" your way into heaven and escape hell (a just and unending "death sentence" for your wickedness -- aka "sin") because you are a so-called "good" cop or person? Take the
Good Person Test
and see how you do!
(2) Jesus' first recorded words in His earthly ministry were and remain, "
Repent and believe in the Good News
" (
Mark 1:15
). To
repent
is a "180" -- a complete, radical change of mind and heart as it relates our sin (wickedness as God defines it). To believe (
pisteuo
in the original Greek) as Jesus intends it here is to cry out to Him for your salvation and wholeheartedly surrender to Him in faith in the same way we have "faith" that our body armor will do its job against the rounds it is intended to stop, that a well-maintained weapon will function properly when used against criminals intent on destroying us or others, or that a parachute will open when it is supposed to (we stake our very lives on it)! And the "Good News"? It is simply
the gospel of Jesus Christ
!
(3)
This same concept of "believe" (the saving kind) is further revealed in
John 3:1-21
where Jesus says, "
... you must be born again
." Again, note our Lord's emphasis on the word " must " (not "may" or "should"): this is ultimately the life-saving/life-changing personal relationship (and NOT "religion") with Jesus Christ that I stress here every week (see
What does it mean to be a born again Christian
? [hint -- there is no other kind]). Folks, it is only through this miraculous event that we can be made "righteous" before a just and Holy God and thus become part of His family.
(5)
Need more? Then check out this powerful, short video message by my friend, fellow officer and noted trainer,
Travis Yates
:
Cops and Salvation
.
(6)
Have you now said "yes" to Jesus but are wondering what to do next? Then click on,
Now what?
Understand that the "Now what?" MUST include regular "iron sharpens iron" fellowship with other believers, including (for us cops) other mature Christian officers who can help support you, encourage you, disciple (help you grow) you in the faith and yes, hold you lovingly accountable. Message me for how you can do that!
Brethren, we're at war! Let's keep training while staying armored up and in the fight behind Christ our Captain!
MC
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ABOUT US
The
Centurion Law Enforcement Ministry
is
a national, FCPO-affiliated, evangelical Christian outreach to our own in law enforcement. These newsletters and Bible studies are part of this effort and past editions can be found on our website and our social media feeds. As always, feel free to adapt these messages for your own individual or group use and please share them with others.
The
Fellowship of Christian Peace Officers
(FCPO)
exists to (1) be used of God to lead the unsaved in law enforcement to a genuine, saving relationship with God in Christ; and (2) provide biblical support ("backup"), accountability and iron sharpens iron fellowship for Christian officers first in the U.S. and throughout the world as well. Our metro-Denver FCPO chapter -- aka
FCPO Chapter 217
-- is a
Centurion Law Enforcement Ministry
affiliate. Locally, we meet approximately twice a month in the south Denver-Metro suburb of Highlands Ranch for profession-focused and life-focused Bible study, prayer and servant-warrior/sheepdog fellowship (the
iron sharpens iron
kind). Spouses are both welcome and encouraged to attend with their LEO.
Contact me for details!
The Centurion Ministry and FCPO-Denver are led by Police Chaplain and Evangelist
Michael "MC" Williams
, an active (32-years and counting) sworn police officer/detective and and sought-after instructor and speaker at churches (including the popular
Centurion Church Security Seminar
) retreats and both police and civilian training conferences and seminars around the country. Contact MC via
email
for details on how to book him for your event.
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