He wasted his life turning windmills into giants.
His wounded mind so desperately wanted a war, that it twisted reality to manufacture one; giving him a much-needed enemy to prove himself heroic.
Quixote measured his worth purely by the battle and the entire time he was really only fighting himself. His identity as courageous warrior was merely a mirage he dreamt up to justify the fight.
This is the story that so much of Christianity finds itself in today; people hopelessly trapped in the perpetual need for a holy war, desperate for conflict, addicted to a perceived danger that merits vigorous defense.
Every day followers of Jesus leverage fear to rally the faithful, imploring believers to “take back America”, to “turn this nation around”, to “win the country back for Jesus”. Entire ministries are built on the image of the bloody battlefield and the approaching godless horde across the expanse.
And whether the bad guys de jour are Muslims or Gays or Feminists or Atheists or Democrats or The Media, the raw-throated cries of the alarmists are quite similar: “These people are the enemy of God and of our righteous cause. They are presently conspiring to engineer our certain demise and without a war our end is imminent.”
Windmill giants.
I’ve checked around, friends. There simply isn’t an organized conspiracy against Christians out there; no clandestine meetings in smoke-filled rooms by well-organized, like-minded masses trying to figure out how to pollute the culture and pry the American people from God’s hand. Life doesn’t work that way, and that’s because people generally live life as individuals not as members of whatever broadly drawn group we like to lump them in with to feed our narrative.
Most folks are simply trying to make it through the day; to do their work, to navigate their relationships, to avoid traffic, and to lose ten more pounds. Overthrowing the country usually isn’t on the agenda, so maybe ours shouldn’t include acting as if we need to rescue it.
I’m so tired of religious war rhetoric and fighting stances and battle lines, of ministries and churches and denominations that depend so fully upon the urgency of imminent combat.
I’m deeply burdened for a faith tradition that’s been hijacked from the strong, steady hands of Jesus and commandeered by skittish soldiers in the Army of the Lord, who’d rather tilt at windmills than feed the poor, care for the sick, visit the prisoners, and do all that “loving others as yourself” business.
Turns out there is a war here, but it’s much closer than we think. It’s not out there in waiting armies or invisible giants.
In fact, it’s in the very same place Jesus said the Kingdom also lives: inside of us. That is the battlefield where stuff is won and lost. There isn’t a culture war to wage. There is only our internal conflict and our personal response to it.
As a result, we American Christians don’t need to ban together to “turn this nation around” or “take it back” or win some external war against ___________. These are manufactured crises that serve as empty calories for a faith deprived of real substance.
We don’t need to flail around breathlessly at every spinning sail that crosses our paths.
We need only to look in the mirror, face our personal mess without flinching, and live our individual lives in a way that best reflects the life of Jesus—period. That is the fight. We get to be the villain or the hero of our own story. We slay the giant when we respond to the world in love.
Christians and those who lead our churches need to stop manufacturing cultural boogeymen and sinister moral threats and encroaching enemies created to rally the troops. That’s a cheap, lazy spiritual card to play, one with ever diminishing returns.
If we’re gonna pick a fight, then it better be worthy. It better be a holy hill worth dying on.
Friends, it turns out the only real war here is an inside job; a daily, personal decision about whether we will be loving, compassionate, merciful, and forgiving—or not. It’s the continual battle for Christlike hearts.
So get off your horse, throw down your lance—and win that damn war.
Otherwise we’re just deluding ourselves, wasting time, and charging windmills.
