Patience with Humanity
Early in the war Ernie Pyle went to North Africa as a correspondent. Already famous for his human-interest stories, he spent most of his time with troops in the front line, writing about the war from their perspective. He was able to report on the transition of these young Americans from civilians to warriors, and he conveyed his belief that they were adapting to the demands of combat and were measuring up well as soldiers. Speaking for them and himself, he wrote,
“The new war finally became the normal life to us.”315 In one poignant article he focused on a profound change within himself, which he considered a “personal redemption”:
[There is] a new patience with humanity that I’ve never known before. When you’ve lived with the unnatural mass cruelty that mankind is capable of inflicting upon itself, you find yourself dispossessed of the faculty for blaming one poor man for the triviality of his faults. I don’t see how any survivor of war can ever be cruel to anything, ever again.316
The reporter’s inclination toward forgiveness of human faults and patience with others are healthy sentiments, and his message is a positive one. Those who have witnessed cruelty on a large scale should be especially averse to inflicting it on a personal level. However, I believe it would be a mistake to consider our own faults trivial when compared with the larger evils of war. War is a product of human weakness and reflects these “trivial” faults on a larger scale. In other words, we are all sinners, and our sin is what causes human conflict at the personal and the international level. Only when we fully accept this fact about ourselves can we understand our desperate need for a savior and redeemer.
Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.
—1 Timothy 1:15