Another one bites the dust
I wonder why we don’t do spiritual assassinations. After all, many of us are soldiers in an army, of sorts, and we speak of taking ‘captives’ for Christ and engaging in spiritual warfare, and we have quarters and soldiers and officers and nutty kernels, sorry, colonels.
I’m not suggesting we plan for someone’s fatal bodily demise – I’m speaking of spiritual assassinations. Let me explain.
I’ve been watching the excellent streaming series ’The Day of the Jackal’, featuring Eddie Redmayne and Lashana Lynch. Some of you will be familiar with the 1971 bestselling book of the same name by Frederick Forsyth or the 1973 film that featured Edward Fox, or even the 1997 remake called ‘The Jackal’ featuring Richard Gere and Bruce Willis.
The action revolves around a persistent investigator searching for an assassin known only as ‘The Jackal’. This master of disguise is a crack shot with almost any firearm. Will they catch him before he claims his next high-profile victim?
I was thinking of how we will sometimes ‘line up a victim’ to spend time with and pray for, not just with a view to growing a friendship but also with a view to seeing them saved and in relationship with Jesus. I recall an older officer once asking me, “Who are you praying into the Kingdom at the moment?”
A spiritual assassination is when we get someone in our sights (for conversion), and they don’t even know it! We plan and pray and scheme and pray and prepare and pray and strategise and pray – until we win them! I’ve known Christians who have prayed for specific people daily for years in faith that they would one day be saved.
Oddly, my mind also goes to a well-known ‘Far Side’ cartoon by Gary Larson where we see a businessman sitting at his desk and, through his window, we see in the small window of a building across the street is a duck. The caption says, ‘Anatidaephobia: the fear that somewhere, somehow, a duck is watching you.’
I wonder if my yet-to-be-saved targets know that a Christian is watching them! I wonder if the hairs on the back of their necks go up when I’m secretly praying for them. I wonder if a cold chill runs down their spine when I mention their name in the same sentence as Jesus’ name. I’ve been known to pray down a large man from 50 yards away, and he didn’t even see it coming. Gospel-shot him right between the eyes.
Spiritual assassins, that’s what we need. I want to be a cool, calm, cold-blooded converter for Christ; a faith-filled ninja; a soul-saving soldier who slips stealthily through the spiritual shadows and strikes surreptitiously at the soul of a struggling sinner (say that without your teeth in).
Maybe we need to move beyond Junior Soldier classes and start ‘assassin school’ to train up spiritual assassins. We need people committed to people and willing to bring them to Christ with a swift, unexpected and well-aimed prayer!
Major Mal Davies is the Assistant Divisional Commander for the Victoria Division
