As you know by now, on a college campus in Utah yesterday, Christian leader Charlie Kirk was assassinated by a domestic terrorist. He was a friend of CompassCare and believed strongly in how we, together, save women and preborn boys and girls from abortion.
Many of us today continue to shake our heads and ask, “Why, God? What are we to do with this kind of tragedy?” Hours after the assassination, Rev. Harden was asked for a pastoral response to this senseless murder in a live 25-minute media interview.
The following is an excerpt of that interview:
Question: “How do we as a nation come back from this? What is the solution for us? As a pastor, Jim Harden, these are the words that we need.”
Answer: “I think that we can go to the words of Jesus Himself when He was asked about the news of the day.
What [Jesus] said was, when you see these terrible things that happen, either they look like tragedies that are not necessarily … caused by anyone, or specific injustices that actually harm our own people, our first response should be to repent…. Our first and immediate inclination should be ‘God, forgive me, help me to follow you.’ Because I have no idea if I’m next…. The reality is, I know that the best thing for me and the best thing for everyone is to be in right relationship with God at all times. Then I don’t have to worry about it.
And I believe that’s where Charlie was. You know, he knew that. Everywhere he went, he was at risk. And he wasn’t taking his life in his own hands. He was giving his life to God.
And that’s what we should do, too. And that’s what repentance basically is. It’s giving my life to God in submission to Jesus Christ, and I’m going to do what He calls me to do.
As I said before, we must stand and stand up tall. Because when we see these kinds of persecutions happening, Jesus said, ‘Stand up straight and look up. For your redemption draws nigh. The time is short.’ (Luke 21:28). So, let’s speak the truth in love. And yes, let’s be angry, that’s fine. But let’s leverage the energy of the anger for righteousness and see a change in America.”
Watch the entire 25-minute interview here.
In prayer for the Kirk family and our nation,
The CompassCare Team
