In primitive times the cost of killing was practically nothing. Even as late as the time of Julius Caesar (100-44 B.C.) it cost only 75 cents to kill an enemy soldier. During the time of Napoleon, the cost had arisen to almost $3,000. In the Civil War, the mortality expense was $5,000. The four years of World War I brought the cost up to $21,000 and in World War II the price amounted to $55,000. The cost of killing in the “Police action” in Korea reached the figure of $75,000 for each enemy soldier killed. When will men sit at the feet of the Great Galilean and learn to “beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks?” In contrast to the above, it has been suggested that it costs slightly less than $15 to convert a man and make him a Christian. Our way of murder and war is costly indeed, and it solves no problems. It only creates more. Christ’s way of salvation is the only answer to the problems of nations and men- and it costs so little. Tragedy it is that we are not willing to pay what it costs.
Harold Osen
