Beheading has become an iconic image of a twisted level of acceptable oppression that Americans would rather overlook because of the brutality of it. The subtext of beheading is that “it is happening over there in those uncivilized lands where brutal men participate in savage ancient acts that are better left discussed only in the rarest of company and never in polite circles of soccer moms and golfer dads.” Sunday mornings in America are full of cereal bowls and neckties. Sunday mornings in the Middle East contain a harsher reality.

Beheading gets talked about when it happens to American Leftists who go to the Middle East to make nice with radicals. It doesn't get talked about when it is innocent Christian children or their parents who live in daily terror. One source I know in Northern Iraq just reported to me that a mass grave was discovered outside Irbil containing 20,000 bodies of Christians murdered by ISIS, many of the victims babies who had been stabbed to death.

The number of beheadings of Iraqi and Syrian Christians is unknown, but the fact that they have been beheaded is indisputable.

One such infamous story recently reported in the global media involved four Iraqi youths aged less than 15 who were stopped by members of the ISIS and ordered to recant their faith in Christ. "Recite the Shahada," they were told, which is the Islamic profession that Mohammed is the Prophet of Allah and that there is no other god but Allah.

The youths refused and were subsequently subjected to the sword of the prophet. According to the Vicar of Baghdad, these four martyrs responded, "No, we love Yasua [Jesus]. We have always loved Yasua. We have always followed Yasua. Yasua has always been with us.” And with that they were beheaded for their faith. This story is not isolated. It is widespread practice in the Middle East among this sect of Salafist Islamic psychopaths.

Contrast this with the upcoming Time story of the year, which is reported to be the shootings of black men by white police officers and the subsequent riots and then chaotic protests that ensued.

Michael Brown, this year’s subject of black oppression, was a 300-pound six-foot-four teen who had just robbed and beaten a convenience store clerk when he was stopped by a police officer. Brown began beating the policeman who subsequently killed him. Mr. Brown died not in a profession of faith in Christ, nor in the act of combating race-based oppression. He died in the act of beating a police officer. The brutal response that followed rivals that of any terrorists. Two cops were subsequently executed because the killer wanted to avenge the death of Mike Brown. Cops across the nation are now on high alert for similar copycat criminal acts being perpetrated by black gangs such as the "Vicious Felons" Gang in Akron, Ohio.

The actual story of the year is really the story of two cultures on two continents with two radically different sets of protagonists and antagonists. While one set of kids are being murdered outright for their faith, another set of kids are being taught to cause as much damage and chaos as they can. When they take matters too far and are killed for their actions, they are lionized as martyrs and turned into the subject of heroic and epic stories with presidential envoys attending their funerals.

The other set of kids are forgotten, their names erased from history, their bodies turn to dust without so much as a picture to remember them on the page of an American newspaper.

Why should we care about the murder of kids and Christians in the Middle East? Why not care about the kids here?

The answer is that until we care about the murder of human beings who are good and kind and innocent, we will never care about kids before they get killed in the act of doing wrong things. Our apathy has less than positive outcomes. The time to prevent kids killing kids or kids being killed on American streets is long before they get to the place where they kill and are killed. America’s polite conversations in polite company need to expand. The time to care for kids is to care first in our own minds about the killing of people everywhere. Rather, we have become de-empathized and show little to no care about killing and brutality and genocide in general.

Certain Americans instead huff and puff, as is evident by the faux self-righteous moralizing rants of people like Al Sharpton and Eric Holder indignant about the Mike Browns of the world after they have gone about terrorizing the streets they walk on. We need to understand that every life truly does matter whether that life is 10,000 miles away or right here in our backyard. Rather than giving place to the divisive figures in American culture, Americans should demand answers from the mirrors they face.

The exasperating question which frustrates many Americans is how to change the brutal acts of savage men 10,000 miles away when we cannot even change the brutal and savage acts of men here in our own nation.

The political answer will be an argument about war. “Do we go to war to invade another sovereign nation to eliminate the savages that keep beheading Christians?”  Will a war against an idea change anything? As an idea is persecuted it gains following. Islam will never be eradicated through bombs and bullets. Islam has one path to elimination: changed hearts and minds.

The journey of 10,000 steps begins with the first step. No matter what journey one embarks it always starts there. Whether it is for good cause of wrong. Americans started their journey away from goodness and kindness long ago. A bible verse that should bring us all to the mirror is from Galatians. The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control.

Our drift away from this sort of biblical morality has brought us a long way from the ability to teach the sort of moral center our children require in order to live lives that matter. It is also a journey back that will bring us to that place where we can say lives matter.

Can we save the Christians dying on the streets of Baghdad and save ourselves? Maybe. Let’s start the journey of 10,000 steps to find out. What’s your first step in 2015? Perhaps a reading of Galatians 5:22 is a good starting point.