Never Let What is Good Lead Us to do What is Bad

   Family? 'Tis a good thing. Home? 'Tis a good thing. But, never let a good thing lead you to do a bad thing.
   I think we sometimes teach each other that the slightest provocation to home and family is going to quickly result in a bullet being blown through someone's head.
   I have heard many a person exclaim how if someone enters their home and in any way threatens their family, they will not hesitate to shoot the intruder dead. I sometimes even sense in them a sense of pride for what they are saying, and a sense of pride for what they would be doing -- killing the intruder. I don't remember whether I've ever heard someone expressing a sense of remorse that they might have to take someone's life in order to protect their family. I do think -- much, do I think -- that even the thought that you might have to kill another person should weigh you down.
   Yes, you might have to kill another person, but it should not be a thought you relish. If you relish the thought of killing someone, hate is in your heart, even if that someone is an intruder in your home. More, such an attitude could lead you to commit the biggest sin there is to commit. If you are trigger happy, you could end up killing an intruder when the intruder doesn't need to be killed.
   Yes, not all intruders need to be killed.
    Now, it is a wise parent who teaches the child to prepare to say "no" when someone offers the child a drug, or a when a stranger offers the the child a ride. We know that preparing the child for such scenarios will make them more likely to make the right decision when the moment comes. We, as adults, are no different. So, if killing is sin, instead of training ourselves on how quick we will commit it, shouldn't we be considering all the scenarios when killing will not necessary? Along with preparing our minds for when we might have to kill, we should also prepare our minds against those moments when it will be a sin.
  All this makes me imagine up a scene that could easily have fitted into a C.S. Lewis book, with a master devil teaching his apprentice that, "The good can be used to justify the bad, my dear apprentice. You must sell the human on the good and then he will buy the bad right along with it. His love of family can be used to justify the killing of an intruder. Imagine, murder in the name of love,"
  Rather than listening to the master devil, I think it better you listen to the voice telling you, Don't let that which is good justify you in doing that which is bad.