From the pen of the persecuted: Should Christians care about politics?

Richard Wurmbrand was an evangelical Lutheran pastor of Jewish origin who was born in 1909 in Romania. When the communists seized his native land in 1945, he became a leader in the underground church. In 1948 he and his wife, Sabina, were arrested, and he served fourteen years in prisons. For three years in an underground cell, he saw no one except his guards and torturers. Christian friends in Norway purchased his freedom for $10,000. Pastor Wurmbrand is the founder of The Voice of the Martyrs. A prolific writer, this selection is from his devotional work Reaching Towards the Heights.

"I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage ." (Exodus 20:2)

Some Christians think that we should not care about politics.

Did Livingstone know the gospel? When he came to Africa, slave trade was going on. Should Livingstone have allowed the slaves to remain slaves? He had read in the Bible how God freed slaves. He could not remain unmoved when he saw the gangs of innocents, chained by the wrists to a long chain, being beaten with whips, exactly
as it happens at the transport of prisoners in many countries today.

These terrible things made Dr. Livingstone bum with anger. Many Christians today have lost the virtue of becoming angry against slavery. Some never do get angry, except against those who fight slavery.

Livingstone never forgot to beg the British people to put down the terrible trade in human flesh and blood. He succeeded. Slavery was abolished in the British empire. Today Livingstone's body lies in Westminster Abbey.

The Jewish ark of the covenant was not only a ritual object, but also an ensign of battle. When the Jews, former slaves, passed the Jordan to fight for a land of their own in which they should be free, the ark was borne by the Levites as a flag would be borne now. It was a symbol of the fight for liberty.

Christians are fighters not only for personal righteousness, but also for righteousness in social relations.