Piety in the Pestilence III

During the past two days’ meditations, we have spoken of how the Christian thinks during trying times. We spoke of the hope we look to even during times of disease and famine, and we spoke of the glory of God. We spoke of the great love with which God created man in the beginning, and the infinite dignity He bestowed upon this greatest of His creations for all time. In all things, we are not compelled by anxiety but by faith, hope, and love. These alone guide our soul. If there be fear at all, it is but the fear of God, not the fear of any created thing. In this the Christian displays himself as being conformed to Christ, both a victor over the world and the lover of it.

As the news cycle daily continues to fuel our worries, I am reminded of a German Lutheran, a member of the anti-Nazi resistance, who was martyred for her cause at the age of 21 in 1943. During the darkest days of the terror of the Second World War, a short time before she was beheaded, she wrote this in her diary:

“Isn’t it a riddle, and awe-inspiring, that everything is so beautiful? Despite the horror. Lately I’ve noticed something grand and mysterious peering through my sheer joy in all that is beautiful, a sense of its creator. Only man can be truly ugly, because he has the free will to estrange himself from this endless song of praise.

It often seems that he’ll manage to drown out this hymn with his cannon thunder, curses and blasphemy. But during this past spring it has dawned upon me that he won’t be able to do this. And so I want to try and throw myself on the side of the victor.”

​Heaven and earth and all sorrows shall pass away, but the Victor, Our Lord Christ, remains forever. We who have been baptized into the army of the victor fear no evil, for His rod and staff shall guide us, and a table He has prepared before us. “Isn’t it a riddle, that everything is so beautiful?”

Pastor Fields