{"id":40045,"date":"2017-03-06T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-03-06T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/military-doctrine-of-shock-and-awe\/"},"modified":"2017-03-06T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2017-03-06T00:00:00","slug":"military-doctrine-of-shock-and-awe","status":"publish","type":"sermon-illustrations","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/military-doctrine-of-shock-and-awe\/","title":{"rendered":"The Military Doctrine of Shock and Awe"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In 1996 two military strategists, Harlan Uliman and James Wade, started advocating a more focused approach to war. Uliman and Wade argued for engaging the enemy with an overwhelming show of force that will destroy &quot;the adversary&#39;s will to resist before, during, and after battle.&quot; They titled their book <em class=\"citation\">Shock and Awe<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n<p>Shock and Awe, also known as Rapid Dominance, is defined as &quot;a military doctrine based on the use of overwhelming power, dominant battlefield awareness, dominant maneuvers, and spectacular displays of force to paralyze the enemy&#39;s perception of the battlefield and destroy its will to fight.&quot; The goal is to render your opponent impotent by using &quot;superior technology, precision engagement, and information dominance.&quot;<\/p>\n\n<p>Shortly before the first Iraq War, Uliman described what would happen with this Shock and Awe approach: &quot;You&#39;re sitting in Baghdad and all of a sudden you&#39;re the general and 30 of your division headquarters have been wiped out. You also take the city down. By that I mean you get rid of their power, water. In 2,3,4,5 days they are physically, emotionally and psychologically exhausted.&quot;<\/p>\n\n<p>In response to human sin and evil, God could have used Shock and Awe. He could have employed Rapid Dominance to crush us with his &quot;overwhelming power, dominant battlefield awareness, dominant maneuvers, and spectacular displays of force.&quot; Instead, the God of all authority and power, chose a radically different strategy: redemptive love, being delivered into the hands of sinners and then laying down his life at the cross. No wonder Paul had to acknowledge &quot;the foolishness of the cross.&quot;<\/p>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tax_ctp_audience":[],"tax_ctp_authors":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[165],"tax_ctp_format":[171],"tax_ctp_illustration_types":[411],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[446],"tax_publications":[140],"tax_ctp_tags":[3578,3738,3978,4048,4088,4089,4141,4191,4232,4400,4563,4671,4952,5310],"tax_ctp_topics":[],"class_list":["post-40045","sermon-illustrations","type-sermon-illustrations","status-publish","hentry","tax_publications-ct-pastors","tax_ctp_tags-christ-crucified","tax_ctp_tags-death-of-christ","tax_ctp_tags-fear-of-god","tax_ctp_tags-gentleness","tax_ctp_tags-grace","tax_ctp_tags-grace-of-god","tax_ctp_tags-help-from-god","tax_ctp_tags-humiliation","tax_ctp_tags-incarnation-of-christ","tax_ctp_tags-love-of-god","tax_ctp_tags-omnipotence-of-god","tax_ctp_tags-power-of-god","tax_ctp_tags-servanthood","tax_ctp_tags-wrath-of-god"],"acf":{"scripture_references":[{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null}]},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Military Doctrine of Shock and Awe - CT Pastors<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/military-doctrine-of-shock-and-awe\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Military Doctrine of Shock and Awe - CT Pastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In 1996 two military strategists, Harlan Uliman and James Wade, started advocating a more focused approach to war. 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