What does God say about martial arts?

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An interesting article was passed to me just yesterday from the religious magazine, Awake!, in which martial arts is discussed from a Christian standpoint. I will quote some from this article so, when you see the quotations, I am citing Awake!, June 2008's article, The Bible's Viewpoint- When is Self-Defense Justified? Before I go on, I would like to say that I am NOT Jehovah's Witness and tend to not deal with religions outside of Taoism while dealing in the arts.

The article starts out with a hypothetical situation in which a burglar breaks into the home. It then opens into sermon, saying "The Bible condemns violence and those who resort to it." From this point, I was already building up judgment of the article and had my defense mentally prepared, especially when the column stated, "The Bible observes: 'Where there is no wood the fire goes out, and when there is no slander contention grows still.' (Proverbs 26:20) Calmness often defuses anger and deflects violent confrontation." Again, my defenses were prepared, yet I continued reading, hoping that the 'turn the other cheek' method was not their answer in the event of a break-in.

The next paragraph not only raised my defenses but also my concerns. Is this magazine telling its readers not to raise arms ever?! Are these people learning to roll over and die if put into a life threatening situation?. I continued and, just over a paragraph later, I read, "The Bible thus indicates that a person may defend himself or his family if physically assaulted. He may ward off blows, restrain the attacker, or even strike a blow to stun or incapacitate him. The intention would be to neutralize the aggression or stop the attack." Now, I breathe a great sigh of relief. The explanation in the magazine goes on to clarify, "When escape is not possible, there is no Biblical injunction against reasonably defending ourselves. Still, the course of wisdom would be to do our best to avoid situations with a potential for violence." This is indeed wisdom and responsibility when providing information regarding martial arts to a large reading audience.

This is a wholesome mindset that every single person would benefit from, going into martial arts. We train to fight not for war, but to prevent war. I applaud the Awake! magazine for providing this article to its readers.