One Man on God’s Side is a Majority
I always laugh when I see some student at BYU, e.g., courageously defying the campus in the service of some cause dear to the elite consensus, like protesting Dick Cheney. Acting as a mouthpiece for the powerful against remnant local resistance requires a little courage, I guess, but not much. Speaking truth for power ain’t that hard.
One of the aims of Christian education, conversely, should be to give the Saints the visceral sense that any religious or political opposition we face is just a little eddy in the implacable current of eternity. Its human nature to want to join the winning side. Our task is remember and to remind which side will win.
The Standard of Truth has been erected; no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing; persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble, calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth boldly, nobly, and independent, till it has penetrated every continent, visited every clime, swept every country, and sounded in every ear, till the purposes of God shall be accomplished, and the Great Jehovah shall say the work is done.
-Joseph Smith.
Agellius
June 15, 2009
“Its human nature to want to join the winning side. Our task is [to] remember and to remind which side will win.”
Wow, is that well said.
G.
June 15, 2009
Thanks, Agellius. I think one of the best expressions of the point I’m making is Stephen Martyr. The Jewish elites had him stoned as an expression of their power over him and over the small band of Christians. But Stephen cries out “I see the heavens opened, and Jesus sitting on the right hand of God!” He has a vision that is much larger than their little world. So its no wonder they gnash their teeth when he says that. In an instant he’s reversed their little demonstration of power. He’s shown that it is he, not they, who is an agent of the real power.
Thanks for that [to], by the way. I’ll fix it.
J. H. G
June 16, 2009
I think it is God, not Stephen who has reversed their demonstration of power. The heavens opened, he did not open them. Of course, Stephen believed before hand that it would be so, even if he didn’t know the manner or the timeframe of that demonstration.
This distinction is important, because 1) we have to exercise faith (as you point out) and 2) the local power may be allowed to exercise complete authority over us, we cannot know, before we are cast into the fiery furnace wether we will be shielded or not.
This both are quite different from your BYU example as the local authorities in this case won’t be allowed to exercise power to that extent – and faith is not needed to read the current political winds.
Anyways this segues nicely to the post on doubt.