Jake McCluskeyStand Your Watch

A Series

Take It by Force

A lone man kneeling on a bare stone floor as a shaft of dawn light falls across his bowed head, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "War on Evil, Peace with Men" set across the graphic.

You were not called to be harmless. You were called to be dangerous to the right things and safe for the right people, and most men have it backward.

Jesus said the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force. This series walks what Scripture actually says about a man taking the fight to evil and keeping the peace with people, one text at a time. War on evil. Peace with men. Get those two backward and every bit of your zeal turns into damage.

An introduction, then fourteen posts. Read them in order.

  1. 01
    A lone man kneeling on a bare stone floor as a shaft of dawn light falls across his bowed head, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "War on Evil, Peace with Men" set across the graphic.

    War on Evil, Peace with Men

    You were not called to be harmless. You were called to be dangerous to the right things and safe for the right people. The introduction to a series on making war on evil and peace with men.

    5 min read
  2. 02
    A watchman standing on a weathered stone rampart at dusk, looking out over a dark landscape, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "War With Amalek, Generation to Generation" set across the graphic.

    War With Amalek, Generation to Generation

    There is a war you were drafted into that does not end. Not when you get older. Not when you finally beat the thing you have been fighting since you were nineteen. Not this side of the grave. And most men lose it slowly

    5 min read
  3. 03
    A heavy old wooden door in a dark stone wall with light bleeding around its edges, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "You Must Master It" set across the graphic.

    You Must Master It

    God warned a man once, out loud, before he did the thing. Told him plainly what was crouching at his door and what it wanted. And the man heard it, and did it anyway, and it was the first murder. His name was Cain, and t

    5 min read
  4. 04
    A man standing in a doorway at night, guarding the threshold between a warm home and the cold dark, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "Abhor What Is Evil" set across the graphic.

    Abhor What Is Evil

    Somewhere a man got the idea that the holiest thing he could do was to stop hating anything at all. To become so soft, so accepting, so endlessly understanding that nothing moved him to disgust anymore. And he wears that

    5 min read
  5. 05
    A man's hand at the edge of a high stone parapet releasing something into the dark below, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "Tear It Out" set across the graphic.

    Tear It Out

    Jesus said the most violent thing anyone has ever said about your sin, and he said it about your own body, and he meant it. Not about your enemy. Not about the world. About the parts of you that keep dragging you down.

    5 min read
  6. 06
    A cold gray fire pit full of dead ash and one last dark ember as first light touches it, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "Put It to Death, Do Not Manage It" set across the graphic.

    Put It to Death, Do Not Manage It

    There is a difference between a man fighting his sin and a man feeding it, and the terrifying thing is how similar they look from the outside. Both of them talk about the struggle. Both of them go to church. Both of them

    5 min read
  7. 07
    A massive dark fortress wall with a deep crack splitting through it and hard light breaking behind, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "Demolish the Stronghold" set across the graphic.

    Demolish the Stronghold

    The war is not lost where you think it is lost. It is not lost at the moment of the act. By then it was already over. It is lost hours earlier, upstream, in the six inches between your ears, in a thought you let walk aro

    5 min read
  8. 08
    An open leather Bible on a dark table with a hard blade of light across the pages, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "The Sword of the Spirit" set across the graphic.

    The Sword of the Spirit

    Every man reading this has been handed a weapon and most of them carry it like a comfort blanket. They fold it up small, keep it soft, take it out when they are sad and want to feel better, and then they wonder why they

    5 min read
  9. 09
    A rugged wooden cross against a bruised storm sky with a shaft of light breaking behind it, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "Overcome by the Blood and the Testimony" set across the graphic.

    Overcome by the Blood and the Testimony

    This whole thing could go to your head. A man reads a series about being spiritually violent, about war and blades and putting things to death, and something in him starts to swell, and he starts to think the victory is

    5 min read
  10. 10
    An overturned heavy table in a dim stone hall, coins scattered, dust hanging in hard light, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "The Whip in the Temple" set across the graphic.

    The Whip in the Temple

    There is a picture of Jesus a lot of men carry that could not survive five minutes in the actual gospels. Soft, mild, permanently gentle, a man who never raised his voice and never disturbed anyone. Then you read the day

    5 min read
  11. 11
    A lone man walking a hard empty road at dawn carrying almost nothing, seen from behind, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "The Good Soldier" set across the graphic.

    The Good Soldier

    You were enlisted. That is the first thing to get straight, because most men live like the Christian life is a thing they signed up for the way you sign up for a gym, an optional improvement they can attend to when it is

    5 min read
  12. 12
    A man still standing at the far edge of a spent, torn-up field at first light, exhausted but upright, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "You Have Not Yet Resisted to Blood" set across the graphic.

    You Have Not Yet Resisted to Blood

    Here is a sentence that will call your bluff, and it is meant to. You have been telling yourself you are at war with your sin. You have been calling it a fight, a struggle, a battle you keep losing. And then Scripture sa

    5 min read
  13. 13
    A great dark fortress gate at dawn with a single small figure advancing before it as light crests the wall, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "The Gates Will Not Prevail" set across the graphic.

    The Gates Will Not Prevail

    There is a defensive crouch that a lot of Christian men have mistaken for faithfulness. Hunker down. Hold on. Protect what little is left. Wait for the end and try not to lose too much ground before it comes. And they th

    5 min read
  14. 14
    First light breaking gold over a broken, ruined dark wall, the rubble lit by the rising sun, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "The Head Already Promised Crushed" set across the graphic.

    The Head Already Promised Crushed

    A man fights differently when he knows the war is already won. Not carelessly. Harder, actually, and freer, because he is not fighting to see whether good will win, he is fighting on the winning side of a thing that was

    5 min read
  15. 15
    A full warm sunrise breaking over a quiet, safe home and still land, the storm gone, in the dark cinematic style of the Take It by Force series, with the words "The God of Peace Crushes Satan" set across the graphic.

    The God of Peace Crushes Satan

    This whole series has been about war. Amalek that never surrenders. Sin crouched at the door. Tearing things out, putting things to death, storming gates, resisting to blood. And it ends, on purpose, with the strangest s

    5 min read
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