Capitulate Or Stand Firm; We Must Choose
Word-Of-The-Day: ‘(12) Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. (13) But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. (14) If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you.’ (1 Peter 4:12-14)
Throughout the Bible, we are repeatedly warned and told Christians will be persecuted; an attack upon us that may range from sharp jibes of ridicule, to restrictions of our speech and movement, all the way to imprisonment, torture, and death. That range of attacks occurred to Jesus during His 3-year ministry on Earth, and throughout Christian history, from the early church just after Jesus’ Ascension until today, there have been Christians who have been persecuted.
Overt persecution has typically been when Christians are at their weakest and are not in great numbers. Prior to Emperor Constantine, especially in the reign of Nero, Christians were often arrested and thrown into the Coliseum to be fodder for gladiators, food for wild animals, or hung on lampposts and lit on fire to light Rome’s streets at night. The Muslim incursions into Jerusalem, Spain and Eastern Europe in the Medieval period of 1100-1300 often had Christians rounded up and killed (in retaliation for the Crusades of the same period), and even the Christian kings – and the Popes – in the latter part of that time turned on fellow Christians like the Knights Templar and other groups that were not towing the edicts of the Vatican and the Papacy.
In modern times, Christians have been arrested, jailed, and killed for sharing the Gospel of Jesus in locations that are not predominately Christian. In the Middle East, India, Africa, China, the Soviet Union, North Korea, and Indochina missionaries and evangelists who have shared Jesus with others have suffered ostracization, imprisonment, or death by political or religious edict. For years, the persecution has been ‘over there’ in these locations, while ‘over here’ in the United States and Europe Christians have been, for the most part, safe.
However, times are changing. In Europe, the mass migration of refugees and illegal immigrants have changed the predominate cultures and traditions of each nation into multi-cultural subsections by the ethnicity of each immigrant group, with a majority of these groups being Islamic. The natives of the European nations and their cultural heritage, including Christian morals and ethics, are being overwhelmed by the cultural norms of these Muslim immigrants.
It appears Britain is the nation most affected; most community mayors and leads, and a sizeable number within the national government, are Muslims with first- or second-generation immigrant backgrounds. It is to the point that Islam fundamentalism is predominant, approved and protected by the government, while Christian worship is no longer allowed in the public forum. Prayers, even silent ones, cannot be given in parks or sidewalks, and singing Christian praises while shopping or walking on the street can result in arrest.
This is also occurring in North America, as well. In Canada, many pastors cannot legally preach parts of the Bible against the ungodly practices of ‘LGBTQ’ activities, as being intolerant and racial and thus against the law. In the more liberal ‘blue’ areas of the United States, as is the case in the Pacific Northwest and the Atlantic Northeast, and one notable event in Minneapolis, Minnesota, several Christian churches have had doors blocked, congregants harassed, and services interrupted by far-leftist groups such as ANTIFA and Black Lives Matter for simply wanting to worship the Lord in peace inside the churches.
The cause of this persecution is simple; God’s people failed to adhere and obey the Word of God and devote themselves to Him. Over time, God and His morals waned and His precepts ignored; as people stepped away from God, the vacuum left in them was replaced with reprobate thoughts and Satanic pursuits. They failed to defend Godly institutions and practices, and failed to defend themselves. Heresy and illicit practices overcame them and the rock-solid Christian morals and ethics gave way to sandy-soiled immorality.
Thus, in today’s news we find reports of two hundred and fifty thousand women raped over the last seventy years in England; globally LGBTQ Pride movements taking center stage and proclaimed ‘normal’ instead of being shamed as abnormal and immoral. Islam, as it is in England, is being promoted and allowed to block city streets in America, while Christians are told to stay quiet and quit showing and proclaiming our Faith out in public.
It has crept into our patriotism of the United States; in a recent poll, those most in line with Christianity, those aligned with the right-leaning Republican Party, had 92% of those polled as supporting the US and feeling patriotic and having allegiance with it. Those aligned with the left-leaning Democrat Party polled their patriotism at an all-time low of 29%.
Never forget the United States was founded on Christian, Godly principles, with the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and its Bill of Rights all considered to be divinely inspired and driven by God. When the people lose sight of God and fail to follow Him, those same people will fall away from the principles that founded our nation and thus will fall away from being patriotic to it. Throughout the Biblical record, when the people fall away from God, the nations under God eventually suffer and collapse, and, as we see in Britain and now the US, the same is occurring.
Jesus knew this would happen to His people, preaching on the Sermon of the Mount in Matthew 5:10, ‘“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” He warned us in John 15:18, “If the world hates you, know that it hated Me before it hated you.” The Apostle Peter echoed Jesus and reinforced this in 1 Peter 4:12-14, the verses of focus of our Word-of-the-Day; we should not be surprised by this. Jesus has stated this, the Old Testament history shows us examples, and the history since Jesus’ Ascension until through today also gives us many examples.
There are two paths we can take. The first is to capitulate to the world, give up on Jesus and embrace the evil debauchery. If we do this, we will ‘gain the world, but lose our soul’ (Matthew 16:26), or have temporary relief of the pain and pressures by conforming to the world by giving up eternal peace with Jesus. Though not Biblically stated at the time, Benjamin Franklin stated, “Those who would give up essential Liberty to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety”, and in terms of Christ, one will not deserve Eternal life, either.
The second path is to be steadfast, stand firm, and be courageous. Be entrenched in your Faith in Christ, and stay on the path of Righteousness and His morals and ethics. Obey God and His Word, and never stop worshipping Him or proclaiming Him as King. This may eventually, even in our relative safety of southwest Florida, mean persecution and the attacks, from ridicule to death and all in-between that it brings.
But being courageous and staying that course can delay or perhaps prevent for a time what capitulation brings; the attempts to bring the abnormal into being normal, evil advertised as good, and the acceptance of our women and children given up as sacrifices to foreign religions by their murders and rape. We broke away from England once before, telling King George III in 1776, ‘You hate us ‘cause you ain’t us’, or in proper terms, ‘we are no longer English because you English are no longer Christian or moral’.
We must again break from the English of today, and those who are anti-Christian and anti-American, for the same reasons as in 1776, and hand them over to their reprobate minds and actions. We need to pray for them and try to witness to them as much as we can, but we must not sink down into the depths with them.
