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Stop the World’s Largest Humanitarian Crisis

Call 1-833- STOP WAR Today. 

Tell your Senators to vote YES on Senate Bill H. Con. Res. 81, a bipartisan bill invoking the War Powers Act (1973) with regard to America’s unlawful military attacks on Yemen video link.

Yemen, the poorest Arab speaking country in the Middle East, is in the midst of the largest humanitarian crisis in the world.  At least 1 million cases of cholera, affecting over 600,000 children, have been reported with no end in sight.

According to the United Nations, 7 million people are on the verge of starvation as the country suffers the largest famine the world has seen in many decades.  One hundred thirty children slowly waste away and die every day from hunger and disease.

Yemeni children suspected of being infected with cholera receive treatment at a makeshift hospital in Sanaa on June 5, 2017.
Yemen is descending into total collapse, its people facing war, famine and a deadly outbreak of cholera, as the world watches, the UN aid chief said. / AFP PHOTO / Mohammed HUWAISMOHAMMED HUWAIS/AFP/Getty Images
NYTCREDIT: Mohammed Huwais/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Yemen’s catastrophe is entirely man-made, and the American church ought to be leading the charge in putting an end to this grotesque proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

American hands are covered in Yemeni blood, for our government remains the primary source of military weaponry, (such as bombs, missiles and fighter planes), intelligence, targeting information, ground support and the financial backing that makes Saudi Arabia’s continuing slaughter of innocent men, women and children possible.

After Yemen’s civil war in 2015, Saudi Arabia decided that it did not approve of the winning faction, largely because they had backing from Iran.  The Saudis (who are Sunni Arabs) and the Iranians (who are Shia Persians) have long been regional antagonists, staring each other down over ethnic and religious divides.

Yemen quickly fell victim to Saudi Arabia’s hatred of Iran when the Saudi’s inserted themselves into the country’s internal affairs, choosing to slaughter and destroy anyone and everything that might assist Yemen’s pro-Iranian side of the conflict.

Tragically, Saudi Arabia’s largest ally is the United States. I say “tragically” because America’s longstanding, irrational hostility towards Iran made us the perfect willing accomplice to horrendous Saudi war crimes.

Yemen is hugely dependent on international food imports (link) to feed its people, the very people who are now dying of starvation because the US/Saudi joint military blockade (stopping all air, ground and sea transportation) is strangling the life out of an entire nation.

Yemen’s cholera epidemic is a direct result of Saudi pilots raining down American made bombs and missiles on Yemen’s water treatment plants, waste disposal facilities, pipelines, reservoirs, irrigation systems and electric grids.

Leaked! Despite War Crimes in Yemen UK Trains Saudi Pilots

This US/Saudi criminal collusion is responsible for an estimated 10,000 deaths, at least half of them civilians, including 140 mourners snuffed out at a village funeral.  While fervishly digging for survivors, rescuers uncovered the tail fin of an American-made bomb buried in the rubble – a gruesome American tombstone over one of hundreds of mass graves financed by the US political establishment.

Bodies of Somali migrants, killed in attack by a helicopter while travelling in a boat off the coast of Yemen, lie on the ground at Hodeida city, Yemen, Friday, Mar. 17, 2017. A helicopter gunship attacked a boat packed with Somali migrants off the coast of Yemen overnight Thursday, killing at least 31 people, according to a U.N. agency, Yemeni officials and a survivor who witnessed the attack. (AP Photo/Abdel-Karim Muhammed)

President Obama unilaterally began our blind support for these Saudi war crimes in 2015.  But the death toll has risen 3 times over during Trump’s presidency.  In March 2017 alone there were more bombing strikes in 1 week than during any given year under Obama.  In the first 7 months of Trump’s presidency, there have been more civilian deaths (between 3,000 to 4,500) than there were during the entire Obama administration.

Every American who claims to follow Jesus needs to rise up, filled with Christian moral indignation, and speak out against these horrific war crimes now underway at our expense.

Who is David Crump and what is HumanityRenewed?

First, a bit about my life experience and educational background.

I finished high school in Seattle, WA where my father eventually retired after 23 years in the U.S. Army. I had long dreamed of becoming a research biologist, so I enrolled in the University of Montana (Missoula) in the hope that I might work with one of my childhood heroes, Dr. John Craighead.

Many of my youthful dreams were realized in those years, and I eventually graduated with a B.S degree in Wildlife Biology (’76).  My time in Missoula became a fertile field for my young Christian faith, largely through the influence of Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship and my staff-leader, Marv

Anderson.  It was also where I met my wife, Terry.

 

It occurred to me that, while I was busy fulfilling my own plans for my life, I had never asked the Lord Jesus what He might want to do with me.

To make a long story short, I eventually sensed that Christ was calling me into Christian ministry.  After graduation, I joined Inter-Varsity staff and moved to Salt Lake City, UT.  Terry and I lived there for 4 years as I helped to develop communities of Christian students at the University of Utah and Brigham Young University.

In 1981 I began to study for my M.Div. degree (’85) at Regent College  in Vancouver, B.C., Canada. Living just south of the border in Blaine, WA, I commuted to my classes, became deeply involved in a local church, and developed lifetime friendships with several families that Terry and I continue to visit whenever we can.

As a life-long student and habitual bookworm, I believed the Lord was calling me to pursue doctoral work overseas.  God paved the way for my growing family to move to Aberdeen, Scotland where I completed my Ph.D. (’88) in New Testament at King’s College, University of Aberdeen. There it was a privilege for me to study with a man I greatly admired, Prof. I. H. Marshall.

While living in Scotland, I continued to explore ministry opportunities by preaching in local churches, volunteering for pastoral visitation in my local parish, and speaking at Inter-Varsity conferences throughout the country.

Much to my surprise, the Christian Reformed Church  we had attended years before in Salt Lake City, asked me to join their pastoral staff.  Eventually, I would become the pastor of this church (’88-’97), which would rename itself Mountain Springs Community Church.

In 1997 I was offered a teaching position in the Religion Department at Calvin College, a private liberal arts school in Grand Rapids, where I taught New Testament and Biblical Theology for 18 years.

Now retired,  I am enjoying my life in NW Montana where the Lord has blessed us with a log cabin in the woods.  I continue to write and research, while indulging my passions for falconry and riding my custom Harley-Davidson chopper as fast as the speed limit allows.

Why is my blog called HumanityRenewed?

As a Christian, I believe that all human beings — regardless of race, gender, ethnicity, religion, nationality, or skin color —  are created as the Image of God.

As a follower of Jesus Christ, I believe that the life, death, resurrection and exaltation of Jesus of Nazareth reveals, for all who are willing to watch, listen and learn, God’s original intentions for humanity: to live in intimacy and obedience with our Creator; to worship him and to fulfill his purposes for us as unique bearers of the Divine Image.

It is impossible for us to realize God’s plan for our existence apart from Jesus Christ. In Christ my humanity is redeemed, renewed and enabled to help others discover the renewing power of Jesus for themselves.