By James Wilson
The Bible is clear: every tear will be dried
and joy will permeate His creation and all who turn to Him. It is equally clear every knee will bow and
every tongue confess Christ is Lord of all.
That time is not yet, but it is a promise of God – if we understand His
Word at all – and so it is a done deal.
We can even say – in this light – there are no un-believers; there are
only believers and pre-believers. We can
know a taste of the joy is already on-line for present believers.
The
tension of what must come because it is promised by the Living God and knowing
we are not there yet is the same tension we find in calling an acorn an oak
tree because it can be no other thing, and calling a fetus a child because its
DNA is irrevocably human. The tension is
real because we await what is not yet but still is.
The
Bible also describes God’s adversary as a roaring and rampaging beast. This adversary manifests its spirit in human
form often enough, as the severed heads in the streets of Mosul and Tikrit
testify. They testify to the consummate
evil of the Jihadists running wild in Iraq.
The same spirit
is manifested in the brutality of Nigeria’s Boko Haram, in the beasts who eat
the hearts of their victims in Syria, and those who massacred so many in Libya
while murdering the equally bestial dictator, Quaddafi. They butchered the
American ambassador to Libya and the men defending him. It manifests in Palestinians who machine gun
shoppers in Jerusalem, pirates who kidnap and murder in the Indian Ocean, and
terrorists who do the same in the mountains of the Philippines and the jungles
of Liberia. It speaks in the mobs who
burn churches and Christians from Egypt to India to Nepal, and in the mullahs who
build nuclear weapons in Iran. These
people have one common thread running through them – the represent militant
Islam and their spiritual roots are as much in Nazi Germany as they are in
Muhammad.
The evil is
never more intimate than when it addresses individuals who displease it. As I write Meriam Ibrahim awaits her death by
stoning in a Sudanese prison. She was
forced to give birth while shackled. Her
sentence is delayed two years so her baby can be weaned before being placed in
the care of those who ordered her death.
She will be lashed one hundred times before the stoning begins. Her crime?
She married a Christian man and herself professes Christ – apostasy
according to the Sharia Law under which her people must bow and suffer.
Leaders in her
government appeared to acknowledge the worldwide outcry for some days, but soon
went back on their promise to release her.
The urge to destroy what displeases is too strong in them.
In Pakistan it
has been a specially bloody Spring for honor killings. Twenty-five-year-old Farzana Iqbal was buried
up to her waist and stoned to death with bricks by family members in front of
the Lahore Courthouse and hundreds of onlookers May 27. Her crime was marrying against her family’s
wishes; she did not even have to profess Jesus to bring the wrath of a false
god down on herself. There were three
more attacks – two of them fatal – in the first days of June and for the same
reasons. Nadia was burnt alive by her
father and brothers. Allah Mafi was
strangled by her two eldest brothers.
Saba Maqsood was shot twice, her body stuffed in a sack, and thrown into
a canal. (She survived.) All three were invited home by their families
on the pretext their sins were forgiven; all were victims of treachery as much
as brutality; there are more than eighty such killings each year in Pakistan
alone. Sharia Law provides all penalties
for the killings waived if the victim’s family forgives the killers. Since the killers were acting on behalf of
the women’s families one can perhaps say the infernal fix is in.
It is a lie to
say all Muslims are militant Islamists.
It is truth to say Jesus Christ died His sacrificial death on the Cross
for each and every Muslim – militant or no – and rose in sacramental
resurrection for them on the third day as much as He did for anyone else. And so there is the tension of living between
what we know He intends for all mankind and the evil we see manifested in so
many. Truth is Muslims are children of
God while Islam is a religion of hatred for all life. The best and only way to address both
realities in the Spirit of the Living God is to live and share the God’s peace
which passes all understanding – not just talk about it. To live there we must become people of
repentance – constantly re-focusing our attention on the One who has come and
is to come. He understands our tendency
to hate better than we do; He counters it with love that defies our
understanding. That is living in the
tension, and nothing else really matters.
James A. Wilson is the author of Living
As Ambassadors of Relationships and The
Holy Spirit and the End Times – available at local bookstores or by
e-mailing him at
praynorthstate@charter.net
No comments:
Post a Comment