I've grown quite fond of a show on the History Channel called "Warriors." In this show U.S. Army Green Beret Terry Schappert goes all over the world to report on the great warrior cultures of history. In one episode he profiled the Zulu people of South Africa. Under the sometimes brutal leadership of Shaka Zulu, this warrior culture changed the very nature of warfare in Africa. But what captured my interest was what happened after the battle.

The Zulu community understood that their men returning from battle had blood on their hands. They did not have the benefit of long range weaponry that made the killing distant and faceless, but instead had experienced the physical and psychological horrors of close quarters combat with edged and blunt force weapons. Reintegrating into a peaceful society after witnessing the bloody carnage of war is no simple matter, especially if there is blood on your own hands. So as the Zulu men returned from fighting they underwent spiritual cleansing rituals which were intended to cleanse their hands of the blood they had shed, freeing their consciences from guilt, their hearts of blood lust, and helping them to transition back into peaceful life inside the community. Schappert, a seasoned combat veteran himself, and clearly moved by this, turned to the camera and said, "We don't have this."

And I really have to wonder why.

Why is it that we find it easy to send our young people off to war, give them the latest, greatest and most effective training and weaponry on the planet, applaud them for accomplishing their mission with honor and valor, and then find it so difficult to reintegrate them into our peace-loving society when the battle is over? The secular authorities take steps to provide counseling, treatment for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and other post-war psychological and psychiatric issues. Certainly the counseling disciplines are vitally important in dealing with these issues, but I am convinced that the Church of Jesus Christ has a profound role to play in the lives of our returning warriors.

To discover what that role is we need to first swallow our western pride and take a lesson from the Zulus. True, the Zulus were animistic in their beliefs and practices, but that doesn't mean the Zulus got it all wrong on the needs of a warrior returning from combat. The Zulus, along with some Native American Indian tribes, correctly understood that the cleansing a warrior needed was deeply spiritual.

For some reason in this present day, we have been largely content to see our returning warriors' needs as primarily mental and emotional, and thus tried to help them in those areas. We honor God's call on some to be warriors. When they return to us from the war zone, we should honor them again by being first in line to offer them spiritual cleansing.

We understand that God created us as multi-layered people - physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual. These layers overlap and intermingle, creating powerful reactions throughout the entire being when any single layer is acted upon. When your heart is broken you can't eat. When your mind is racing you can't sleep. Fasting quickens the spirit. Emotive music can soothe and pacify or excite and invigorate the mind and body. God created us as complete beings and never intended that any part of us be neglected. Plato went too far when he valued the spiritual to the exclusion of the temporal. Our temporal aspects are also precious in God's sight! But the spiritual layer is foundational to the rest, and outside of Christ the spirit is dead.

Now if the body, heart and mind (our physical, emotional and intellectual aspects) have been scarred by the horrors of war, the path for the person's healing and cleansing is by the blood of Christ that brings life to our spirits. Jesus gave his life for that returned warrior in your midst. Can't Jesus also make powerless the memories that fester and haunt him in the middle of the night? Isn't the Son who raised the dead also able to heal war-scarred hearts and minds?

The U.S. is now faced with the tremendous challenge of caring for the many service members returning from battlefields in the Middle East. Some of these brave soldiers have shed the blood of the enemy, and some may feel their hands are stained by the blood of their brethren whom they were not able to save. The secular world can help them physically, emotionally and intellectually, but only the Lord Jesus can heal the spiritual wounds. As the nation welcomes them home with pomp and circumstance, let us, the Church, welcome them home with minds that understand them, hearts that weep with them, arms that hold them and hands that pour the oil of anointing in rich, spiritual ceremony, washing their hands, hearts, minds and spirits in the cleansing blood of Christ.

Pastor Steve Paulson seves Greater Grace Church in Portland Oregon.