A few days after the election, I received an invitation to join a “resistance” group on Facebook. Out of curiosity and concern for the state of our nation, I accepted. As I read posts in the group and elsewhere, though, I became increasingly uneasy with the language of “resistance”. Some of it was clearly written to keep readers emotionally engaged and the financial contributions flowing. Some of them flirted with election denialism. More so, though, my disquiet was with the spiritual implications of “fighting” and “resisting”.
For those of us who are members of, or have loved ones who are members of, vulnerable or marginalized groups, this is personal. The natural human reaction is to get angry, to resist, to fight back, to repay “an eye for an eye”. Nevertheless, Jesus taught, “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”1 Now, “this is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?”2
The creation of the universe is declared “good”, not perfect. It is, visibly, broken and imperfect. We are called not to be of the world but to seek the Kingdom of God. We are called to seek justice, but not promised that it will be achieved on our timeline. Thus we persist in faith. The righteous “were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth.”3
It is not enough to seek justice. Motives matter. “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives”.4 The call to “resist the devil”5 is the call to resist the temptation to evil within us. Do we act out of fear, anger, or hate? Or from a place of compassion and love? The temptation is to seek salvation through human action or politics (which is “of the world”) rather than through faith in God. If we resist evil from a place of anger or hate, we risk becoming what we despise. As Paul writes in his first letter to the Corinthians, “If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.”6
Resistance breeds counter-resistance; love disarms. We must seek justice by standing with the oppressed, not by standing against the oppressors. As with so many things spiritual, the answer is “yes, and”. Yes, we must seek justice, and yes, we must love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. “The goal … is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.”7 Let us be defined by what we stand for rather than what we stand against.
The leaven does not resist the kneading of the dough; instead, it sets to work to transform it from within.
1. Matt. 5:44
2. John 6:60
3. Heb. 11:13
4. James 4:3
5. James 4:7
6. 1 Cor. 13:2
7. 1 Tim. 1:5
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