6. Counterattack
6. Counterattack
But what can Christians do? What should they be trying to do? Answering with headings only (for space precludes anything more), I reply: we must aim, with God's help, to do four things together.
First, recover vision, the vision of true humanness under God, the goal towards which Christian action in society must always be directed.
Second, restore concern, and avoid the tolerance trap, by which I mean willingness to tolerate the intolerable. I know that tolerant inaction is a prime virtue in a permissive society, but I also know that all that is needed for evil to triumph in any human situation is for good men to do nothing. You know that too.
Third, renew evangelism, making it our top priority to win our fellow men and women to faith in Christ.
Fourth, rebuild community, at home in the family and abroad in society, so creating a milieu which helps on the human maturity that flows from Christian faith.
Some sentences from Nehemiah's narrative of the rebuilding of ruined Jerusalem say what we all need to hear as we contemplate this daunting task.
Sanballat and Tobiah plotted together to come and fight against Jerusalem and to cause confusion in it. And we prayed to our God, and set a guard as a protection against them day and night. . . .
I looked, and arose, and said to the nobles and to the officials and to the rest of the people, "Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and terrible, and fight for your brethren, and your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your homes."
I said to the nobles and to the officials and to the rest of the people, "The work is great and widely spread, and we are separated. . . . In the place where you hear the sound of the trumpet, rally to us there. Our God will fight for us" (Nehemiah 4:7 f., 14, 19 f.).
Amen.
Notes
1 Hans Kung, On Being a Christian (London: Collins, 1977), p. 31.
2Time, August 22, 1977, p. 5.
3Max Jones and John Chilton, Louis (St. Albans: Mayflower, 1975), p. 226.
4Cf. Matthew 11:28-30. The Prayer Book Communion Service introduces verse 28 with the invitation: "Hear what comfortable words our Saviour Christ saith unto all that truly turn to him."
5Exeter: The Paternoster Press, 1976.