"Deliverance Will Rise" - Thoughts on Afghanistan, the Holocaust and Our Responsibilities

If you've been online at all over the past month, you will have noticed there's a crisis occurring in the Middle East.

As soon as American soldiers headed for home, Taliban forces moved in and took over the country of Afghanistan.

I know a lot of people who are upset.  

There are those who are angry that troops were removed from the Middle East; others become defensive over the idea of having to share their "home country" with refugees; some are simultaneously grieved and inspired by the stories coming from within the country's border; and there are those who wish they could live in their own native land in peace, free from the tyrannical authority which threatened destruction and drove them out.

I am not inclined to sarcasm.  It is not a natural function for me.  So please trust me when I say - there are many who are labeling this current point in history as "the end of the world", and I do love them.

But I feel like we're missing the whole point.

Have we truly never faced worldwide disease, corruption and uprisings before...... or have our memories just become terribly short as of late?

In the book of Esther, chapter 3 - we read of a plot constructed by Haman (chief bad-guy supreme) to kill the Jews.  

Let's just pause for a moment.

We're talking about the brutal slaughtering of an entire people group.  I think it becomes pretty easy for us to just skim over the phrase "kill the Jews" and move along with the story.

Needless to say, when Mordecai and others learned of his plan (that is, Haman's fascination with genocide) - it must have felt like their world was ending.

I mean, isn't that what you might feel?  Isn't that what the people of Afghanistan are feeling right now?

A few days ago, I came home from a presentation done at our local library about the Holocaust, which featured stories from survivors.

We heard many moving accounts - one of which included a father and his son who were on a train bound for Auschwitz-Birkenau.  Desperate to give his son the only chance he might have at survival, the father gripped the barbed wire covering the small window in the train car, and wrenched it apart - shoving his son out the window of the moving train....... perhaps you have heard similar accounts as of late, which occurred much more recently then seventy-six years ago.

There were other narratives - civilians who hid entire families for months on end at the risk of losing their own lives; concentration camp survivors who are using their years left to create awareness of the result of hatred; children who were shipped away by parents who knew they'd never be able to follow them.

The gentleman who gave the presentation took great care to remind us that evil will dominate our world when Truth, Beauty and Goodness do not pervade our society.  

This happens when people refuse to protect the basic rights of each living being (whether they are unborn, elderly, disabled, or belong to a different ethnic group or religion than we are used to having as neighbors).  It happens when we are only concerned about the things and the people who are valuable to us.

The moral decline of society depends not as much on the presence of evil as on the absence of light.  It happens when no one is willing to speak out alone, when there is no spark of Truth by which to define the dark.

"First they came for the Communists,

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Communist.

Then they came for the Socialists,

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Socialist...

Then they came for the Jews,

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me -

And there was no one left

To speak out for me."

-Martin Niemöller

Maybe you want to bury your head in the sand.  Move to some remote cabin.  Ignore the cries of the world around you and build your bunker for the "apocalypse".

But God's story has NEVER been pointing us to hide in basements with the canned goods "until this is all over". (Mark 16:14-20)

I've heard many speak as of late on how they are concerned with the condition of our world and the ethics of our society.

You might hear a lot of folks reading the book of Revelation, declaring how "The End MUST be near because LOOK at all this bad stuff happening!"

One of the most basic principles of solid hermeneutics is that "vague texts" must be interpreted in light of the entirety of Scripture.  Not the other way around.

Most people run to Revelation excited to form their own perception of exactly what the "final days" might look like... and yet skip right over the beginning.  John didn't start the book with "The sky is falling!" - but instead encourages people to repent and "live their lives in a manner worthy of the calling to which they have been called." (Eph. 4:1)

We have a choice, Church.  We can build our little fortresses, fret over the inconveniences we face and burrow down deep enough that we don't hear the cries of those around us.  

But the whole world is full of people waiting for an Esther to stand up, afraid but willing.  The human race is hungering for Truth that sets them free from the darkness which has defined them, and reminds them of the value in their neighbor's soul.  

Maybe for some people, such courage will require them to hand over their very life....it certainly did in the 1930's and 40's.

Are we willing to count that cost?