ISIS Helpfully Provides a Christian Military Illustration

No, I am not kidding about the headline.  No, I am not off my rocker . . . at least I do not think I am.  But, anyway, I read the following about ISIS, and a light bulb turned on inside my head.

ISIS leaders select foreign jihadists for suicide missions because they usually arrive in Syria with little or no battlefield experience and so have no military value.

According to one ISIS insider who fled the group, special training camps have been set up inside Syria which filter out foreigners with no military experience and prepare them for suicide operations. 

A security source who works with British Muslim communities on combating extremism told MailOnline that he had been made aware of a number of British fighters who had been unprepared for the reality of Syria: 

'The problem is that young British Muslims who go over to Syria thinking they will be treated like equal brothers by IS find out very quickly that they are being told to strap on suicide vets and prepare for Jannah [heaven]....it's hardly surprising that they have cold feet about these missions.'

One can imagine.  And indeed defections among those appointed to die are something of a problem for ISIS.

A source from inside Raqqa, the capital of the Islamic State in Syria, told Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently [an anti-ISIS group] that ISIS has set up road blocks and imposed strict security checks to stop suicide bombers abandoning their missions.

Summary execution awaits those who are caught.

I read this and almost immediately thought – is this not like joining Satan’s brigades?

Satan promises worldly glory.  Indeed, that is exactly what that fraud offered to Jesus as he fasted in the wilderness.  (Matthew 4: 8, 9)  He still offers worldly glamour as ISIS promises the glamour of fighting for a revolutionary cause . . . or is that a devolutionary cause?

And both Satan and ISIS promise rewards after this life as well. Satan fools people into thinking Hell is just a big party with the fun crowd. ISIS fools people into thinking suicide bombing results in 70 virgins.

Speaking of false advertising, both Satan and ISIS fool recruits into thinking they will be treated well, like “brothers.”  But once the recruits are in and enrolled, they are not treated well as all.  Their treatment is instead, well, Hellish.  That is how Evil operates.

And neither Satan nor ISIS like defectors either and will stop them and kill them if they can.

The armies of evil attract the foolish with marked success.  But the end results for the fools are not so attractive.

There is a way that seems right to a man,

                  but its end is the way to death.

                  Proverbs 14:12 ESV

Thanks be to God there is a better army to join.  But that will have to wait for another post.