Where is the hope? In a time of great persecution, Christ foretold the future and said, “Let not your heart be troubled.” John recorded that day in Jerusalem, and how the Disciples struggled to understand what was being said, somehow there was unbounded hope beyond darkness, a heaven beyond earth. John 14:1.
In this Easter season, as many prepare for Easter, Christ’s words return. “In my Father’s house are many mansions…I go to prepare a place for you,” was his promise. Thomas pressed: “We know not whither thou goest, and how we can find the way.”
Christ understood Thomas, how doubt erodes conviction, unknowing leads to fear, causing a heart to quiver, and offered comfort: God’s love was theirs in proportion to their faith. The “truth” was unchanging, miracles he performed proof of “my Father’s” love, “ye … have seen Him.”
In time, of course, what Christ – and the Old Testament – foretold occurred, just as foretold, and what was a mystery became clear. Thomas and those who dared to believe found themselves comforted, empowered, and surrounded by the presence Christ spoke of.
In some ways, the world is dark again – or perhaps it never changes. Those of faith are bullied, buffeted, and browbeaten, arrested for their faith. They are targeted for their moral compass, and conscience, not bowing to social norms or government mandates.
In this season especially, but in all seasons, how do we deal with rising intolerance for and persecution of those who hold dear the tenets of Christianity, honest belief?
The answer is, despite the anti-family, anti-tradition, anti-faith, and anti-constitutional sentiment – all the hoopla and demand that we accept the pro-conformity, pro-government, pro-atheistic demagoguery – reality does not change. The truth – in our Constitution and in the Bible – remains just that, the truth.
As true today as in ancient Egypt, power corrupts. We do not call them Pharaohs, but those in power too often seek to perpetuate it through coercion, demagoguery, shame, and making those who do not conform social outcasts. None of this is new.
Put differently, the elevation of government to God-status in ancient Egypt, roughly 3150 BC – “Before Christ,” not the secularized BCE, “Before Common Era” – is not so different from what we are seeing today, what the Chinese people suffer, what the Russians suffered under the Soviets, and what now creeps forward.
Those of Christian faith – or any strong faith – hold God in higher esteem than the Government. It is just a fact, a corollary of their faith – but one that infuriates, at times terrifies, those who think the Government should be almighty.
While we are part of a civil society, and so “render under Ceasar what is Ceasar’s” – that is, we follow the laws that keep us functional, our conscience does not belong to Ceasar. Nor are sincere religious convictions subject to bulldozing.
So, back to that question: How do we handle rising pressure to abandon our conscience, shed lifetime values, dispose of our moral compass, and follow the herd, let others tell us what to do? How do we not give in to get along?
We return to basics, remember government is not the final arbiter of conscience. Government is never the last word – on right and wrong, who we are, what we do.
We, the People, decide our fate – individually and together. We, the People must have the confidence to know ourselves, and – especially in this season –lean on our faith, rely on it in dark times, and recall the promise.
Many know The Beatitudes and heartening verses from the Old and New Testaments, the 23rd Psalm’s proclamation “I will fear no evil” and Isaiah 40:31: “They who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”
But we have more. We have other words, direct and clear, from which to take heart, words of comfort that encourage us to look up not down, forward not back.
The words in John 14:1 were followed by Christ speaking again, there in Jerusalem, not long before he and the disciples headed north to cross the Kidron Valley between the Temple Mount and Mount of Olives, before that first Easter.
Said Christ: “Peace I leave with you. My peace I give unto you, not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” So there it is: Fear is defeated by courage, and peace is found in faith, always and forever. There is the hope.
Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC.
