Introduction: Theology in Blood and Fire

The history of God’s people is not one of ease. It is a history of blood and fire, of conflict and persecution, of tears shed beneath the shadow of the cross. From the prophets who were stoned, to the apostles who were martyred, to the Reformers and Puritans who faced sword, prison, and exile, the testimony of Scripture and history is plain: “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Tim. 3:12). The world is fallen. It hates the Lord and despises those who bear His name (John 15:18; 1 John 3:13).

The Reformers and Puritans understood this with an intensity many of us cannot imagine. Their pulpits were often raised against a background of civil unrest, wars of religion, and even executions over questions of doctrine and worship. Theirs was not an age of safe Christianity but of fiery testing. John Calvin was exiled from Geneva because he dared to apply Scripture to cherished traditions.¹ Martin Luther stood before the Diet of Worms, declaring, “My conscience is captive to the Word of God… Here I stand, I can do no other.”² John Knox thundered in Scotland against the tyranny of Rome, reputedly saying, “One man with God is always in the majority.”³

The Puritans, too, lived under the shadow of persecution. John Bunyan, author of *The Pilgrim’s Progress*, spent twelve years in prison because he refused to cease preaching the gospel without state permission.⁴ Richard Baxter, the great Puritan pastor, was hounded by authorities and often forbidden to preach.⁵ Yet in prison, in exile, and in danger, they sang and prayed, because they knew the truth: our hope is not in this world.

Today, the forms of opposition are different, but the substance is the same. When Charlie Kirk engaged students on college campuses, he encountered not mobs with swords, but a tide of secular humanism—a spirit of the age every bit as hostile to Christ as the councils and kings of old. Charlie, like the Reformers, did not engage in hatred. He loved those before him. He sought not to win arguments, but to call students to think deeply about what they believed and why. His widow’s public forgiveness of the man accused of killing him testified to a gospel stronger than death.⁶

This essay will consider these truths in three parts:

1) We live in a fallen world which hates God and the person of Jesus Christ.
2) Christians have the hope of eternal life with Jesus and will be hated for it, for Christ is a stumbling stone to the blind and an offense to worldly wisdom.
3) Our goal on earth is to live as salt and light, willing to lay down our lives for Christ, praying for revival so our nation might yet shine as a city upon a hill.

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Part I: A Fallen World That Hates God

The Bible does not hide the reality of hostility toward God. From the serpent’s lie in Eden, to Cain’s murder of Abel, to the crucifixion of Christ, Scripture records the enmity of the fallen world against its Maker. Jesus told His disciples, “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you” (John 15:18). The apostle John echoed, “Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you” (1 John 3:13).

1. The Reformers and Conflict with the Age

Martin Luther, confronting the corruptions of Rome, recognized that the world is governed by powers of darkness: “The devil, the world, and our flesh are three powerful enemies.”⁷ Luther’s courage at Worms was not born of confidence in himself, but in Scripture: “Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Scriptures or by clear reason… I am bound by the Scriptures I have quoted, and my conscience is captive to the Word of God.”²

John Calvin, expelled from Geneva in 1538, wrote of the hatred directed at those who stand on Scripture: “Wherever the word of God is purely preached, men are so enraged that they cannot bear it.”⁸ His exile was not the mark of failure but of faithfulness in a world that despises truth.

John Knox endured exile and danger because he believed that God’s truth must confront the powers of darkness, whatever the cost.⁹ The gospel he preached was a sword and a balm—dividing the thoughts of the heart while healing the wounded conscience by directing it to Christ alone.

2. The Puritans Under Pressure

The Puritans bore the scorn of the world. John Bunyan was told he could go free if he would simply stop preaching without a license. His reply was steadfast: “If I was out of prison today, I would preach the gospel again tomorrow by the help of God.”⁴ Richard Baxter, in *The Reformed Pastor* and *The Saints’ Everlasting Rest*, presented a vision of ministry and hope that could not be contained by state censors.⁵ John Owen warned that the believer’s greatest enemies are indwelling sin and the allurements of the world; the remedy is Christ crucified and risen.¹⁰

3. Modern Parallels: The Campus and the Square

In our own day, the battlegrounds are not altars and thrones, but classrooms and digital forums. Yet the hostility is the same. Secular humanism saturates universities, teaching that man is the measure of all things, that morality is relative, and that faith is folly. Charlie Kirk stepped into this environment not with hatred, but with love. Like Paul at Mars Hill, he reasoned with those before him (Acts 17). Some mocked, some dismissed, and some listened. This is the pattern of the fallen world: truth is always offensive to those who reject God (1 Cor. 1:18–25).

The Reformers faced swords and prisons; Charlie faced scorn and, ultimately, violence.¹¹ Both testify to the same reality: the world hates Christ.

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Part II: The Hope of Eternal Life

If we only saw the hatred of the world, we might despair. But Christians are not defined by the world’s hostility. We are defined by Christ’s victory.

1. The Biblical Hope

Jesus said, “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms… I go to prepare a place for you” (John 14:1–2). Paul declared, “If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead” (1 Cor. 15:19–20). Our hope is not fragile optimism; it is anchored in the resurrection.

2. Voices of the Reformers and Puritans

John Owen wrote, “The saints in heaven are happy, because they are with Christ. They see Him as He is, and are made like Him.”¹⁰ Jonathan Edwards proclaimed, “The enjoyment of God is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied… God is the highest good of the reasonable creature.”¹² Richard Baxter sang, “My knowledge of that life is small, the eye of faith is dim; but ’tis enough that Christ knows all, and I shall be with Him.”¹³

The Reformers and Puritans lived and died in hope because they knew death could not rob them of Christ. Their hope was not in the advance of earthly kingdoms, but in the kingdom that cannot be shaken (Heb. 12:28).

3. A Witness of Peace

Charlie’s confidence was not in his own strength or political victories. His peace came from the hope of eternal life in Christ. He was not afraid to be hated, because he knew that to live is Christ and to die is gain (Phil. 1:21). He loved students enough to speak truth, knowing some would reject him and some would despise him, but trusting that God would draw His own (John 6:37–39). His widow’s forgiveness embodied Christ’s own words, “Father, forgive them” (Luke 23:34).⁶

The world offers false hopes: utopian states, secular progress, human achievement. But all such dreams are built on sand. The Reformers knew it. The Puritans knew it. And countless believers today know it: only Christ gives eternal hope.

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Part III: Lights in the Darkness

If we live in a fallen world and our hope is in eternal life, how then should we live? Jesus gives the answer: “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden” (Matt. 5:14). Our calling is to shine as lights, to be salt in a bitter age (Matt. 5:13–16; Phil. 2:15).

1. A City Upon a Hill

John Winthrop, in his 1630 sermon *A Model of Christian Charity*, told the Puritans: “We shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us.”¹⁴ He believed the community of God’s people must display Christ’s light to the world. William Bradford, governor of Plymouth, wrote of the Pilgrims: “They knew they were pilgrims, and looked not much on those things, but lifted up their eyes to heaven, their dearest country.”¹⁵

John Bunyan’s *Pilgrim’s Progress* paints this vividly: the Christian is on a journey through a world filled with Vanity Fair, Giant Despair, and Doubting Castle, yet guided by the light of Christ toward the Celestial City.¹⁶ C. S. Lewis would later speak of these earthly days as the “shadowlands,” reminding us that the joy of heaven is the substance for which our present joys are but shadows.¹⁷

2. The Puritan View of Vocation

To be light is not merely to speak, but to live. The Puritans taught a robust doctrine of vocation: all honest work is a calling by which we serve our neighbor and glorify God.¹⁸ Whether farmer or mother, artisan or magistrate, the Christian is to “do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). This vocation is illuminated by the Word, strengthened by the fellowship of the saints, and adorned with good works (Titus 2:10; 3:8).

3. Modern Application: Faithful Presence

For us, being light means speaking truth in love (Eph. 4:15), living faithfully in families, workplaces, and communities (Col. 3:12–17). It means refusing to be silent when God’s Word is mocked, yet responding not with hatred, but with grace and courage (1 Pet. 3:14–16). We are not saved by our good works, but saved *for* good works (Eph. 2:8–10), that the watching world may “see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 5:16).

Charlie modeled this. He did not shout down opponents. He asked them to think. He bore witness to Christ in love. His death reminds us that the world’s hatred is real, but so is Christ’s light.¹¹ And the gospel still saves (Rom. 1:16).

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Conclusion: Pray for Revival—Be the Light, Build the City

Our work here is to be light in the darkness, salt in a bitter world, faithful unto death. We must pray for our nation—that by God’s mercy it might be a “city upon a hill,” as John Winthrop preached and William Bradford labored to build.¹⁴¹⁵ We need revival, and the flame of revival is kindled in the heart of each believer, fed by the Word of God (Ps. 119), the fellowship of the saints (Acts 2:42), and good works that point beyond us to Christ (Matt. 5:16).

Jesus Christ is King of Kings and Lord of Lords (Rev. 19:16). Western civilization’s best moments were born not from the dream of a secular utopia but from men and women shaped by the Jewish and Christian Scriptures—people who believed that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (Prov. 9:10), that truth is not invented but revealed, and that grace reigns through righteousness to eternal life (Rom. 5:21).

The world will hate. The cross will offend. But the tomb is empty. Therefore, “be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain” (1 Cor. 15:58).

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Notes (Select Sources for Further Strength)

¹: Calvin, *Institutes of the Christian Religion*, esp. Book IV; see also biographies summarizing his 1538 exile from Geneva.
²: Luther, “Speech at the Diet of Worms” (1521), often anthologized; *Works of Martin Luther*.
³: Attributed to John Knox; spirit reflected in *History of the Reformation in Scotland*.
⁴: Bunyan, *Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners*; see also *The Life and Death of Mr. Badman* and prison history before *The Pilgrim’s Progress*.
⁵: Baxter, *The Reformed Pastor*; *The Saints’ Everlasting Rest*; see life summaries on his ejections and prosecutions.
⁶: Erika Kirk’s public statement of forgiveness, widely reported; e.g., Fox News (Sept. 2025) and C‑SPAN clip.
⁷: Luther, *Large Catechism*; see also *A Mighty Fortress Is Our God* for the triad of enemies.
⁸: Calvin, *Sermons* and *Institutes* (remarks on resistance to the preached Word).
⁹: Knox, *History of the Reformation in Scotland*; sermons and letters during exile.
¹⁰: Owen, *Meditations on the Glory of Christ*; *Of the Mortification of Sin in Believers*.
¹¹: Coverage of Charlie Kirk’s death during a university event (Sept. 10, 2025), e.g., Reuters/AP/CNN/ABC News timelines.
¹²: Edwards, “The Christian Pilgrim” and *Religious Affections* (on joy in God).
¹³: Baxter, *The Saints’ Everlasting Rest* (poetic excerpts commonly quoted in hymnals).
¹⁴: Winthrop, “A Model of Christian Charity” (1630).
¹⁵: Bradford, *Of Plymouth Plantation*.
¹⁶: Bunyan, *The Pilgrim’s Progress*.
¹⁷: C. S. Lewis, *The Last Battle* (the term “Shadowlands” is popularly used of his closing image).
¹⁸: On Puritan vocation, see William Perkins, *A Treatise of the Vocations*; see also Baxter’s pastoral writings.