Evidently mega pastor Rick Warren's trip to Syria paid off. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad may have answered Warren's peace offer by assassinating one of Lebanon's most prominent Christian leaders Read about it here  I  And here. And, everybody besides the Warrens of this world know it.

Please don't take my words wrong. Sometimes I wish I could be more like many of our modern Christian leaders. But, I'm not. I see the world differently. I see it a bit more dangerous than most of them seem to think. I believe the Syrian leader saw Warren's peace offer as another sign of Christian weakness and he responded accordingly.

But, we Christians do have our weakness. You have yours and I have mine. That's why it's so important for us to always remember the true source of our strength. It's not our politics, it's not our wealth or success, it's the cross. And if we ever forget that, we Christians quickly become the weakest of the weak and easy prey to our enemies.

You see, idolatry is a subtle spirit. It begins as a gentle drift that we seldom feel. That's why we need to keep reminding ourselves of the important basics of our faith. As the the writer of Hebrews says, "For this reason we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it" (Hebrews 2:1 New American Standard Bible).

No, I'm not calling Warren an idolater. I just think in some ways he's wrong. The hard truth is, it's an evil and dangerous world that we live in. Peace won't come because we think we've become something we're not. It will only come when our Lord and Master returns from heaven and makes it happen. In the meantime, our response should be to seek more of the cross, not less.

And when you think about it, that's the toughest thing.