It’s true that too often the world feels like a place where darkness has triumphed. It’s true that it’s difficult to avoid the corruption and decay that rampant sin has brought upon us. It’s true that we’ve been willing participants in this destruction of morality, and that we’ve played a part in allowing the demonic to spread as far as it has.
We’ve acted like cowards, hiding our faith out of convenience and fear, failing to step up and defend the Truth when lies were being spread unrestrained.
Judas would have never betrayed Christ like we have. Every day, we betray Him with our choices, we betray Him with our words, and we betray Him with our deeds. We are the ones who crucify Him, and we are too willing to scream “we have no king but Caesar”.
We like to think that we would be martyrs if persecution came, but our actions tell a different story. Do you really think you’d be ready to die for Him if it came to that, when you cannot even stop pumping yourself full of junk food and mindless entertainment?
There is no point in pressing on the wounds of guilt that all of us carry for failing to do our part. What’s done is done, and our past actions have no remedy.
What matters is what we do right now, and in the years we still have left. Even though we deny Him like Peter, and betray Him like Judas, God’s mercy reaches out to us, and offers a redemption that we do not deserve.
I too have been consumed by resentment. Against myself, against men, and against all of us, as people who deserve no salvation. I have let myself believe in the futility of it all, and looked around hopeless at a world that needs to burn.
But I have also seen in the eyes of many the noble desire for redemption and the spark of something new. They have made bearable the all-consuming darkness that plagues us, and they have brought warmth into a world too often cold. I have found comfort in the Word of God and it’s becoming more and more obvious why the world deserves another chance.
Because even in the most terrible of darkness, when evil holds clear power over us, and pride and arrogance and envy have poisoned the hearts of most, whatever spark of good is left will always be enough to justify us fighting back. Anything else would be to surrender and stab God in the back.
Because even while it’s clear the lights of this world are dimming and it feels too close to the end of time, it’s never too late to change our ways and redirect the course of our lives towards all that’s good, strong and pure.
We can salvage what we can from this fallen world by living virtuously, and by inspiring others to do the same. We can refuse to accept defeat at the hands of the gates of hell, and trust instead the promise of redemption that tells us that darkness cannot win.
Maybe there will never be another Eden, but we place our hope not on memories of a better time, but on the Savior Who makes all things new. He promises us that if we persevere in our faith, no amount of suffering will compare to the glory that’s to come.
We can find rest in knowing that after this earth comes a better one, that after the Eden we destroyed comes life eternal, that our Lord loves us so much that He died to bring us to Him.
We can keep walking towards salvation, and set our gazes on the new paradise that’s to come at the end of time, when Jesus returns in all His glory.
We can awaken one day in a place without pain, and we will know then that our suffering was worth all the blood we shed and all the tears we cried.
Ad Maiora Nati Sumus,
Juan
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