Easter, Hope for the Good

We'll take a break from Counterbang for the week. That is an exercise in exposing falsehoods, whereas Easter seems more like a day for speaking truths. Plus, most of Ethan's posts this week have been about the black hole photo, which is something I'll be covering anyway.

This Easter, the following snippet out of Paul's second letter to the Thessalonians seems relevant.

The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with how Satan works. He will use all sorts of displays of power through signs and wonders that serve the lie, and all the ways that wickedness deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.

Clearly, evil times are nothing new. Also apparent is that Paul, the founder of Christianity, used the story of Jesus to instruct his followers on the role that evil plays in the world. It certainly seems prophetic in relation to today's world. He preaches against lies, delusion, and wickedness, and that salvation lies in loving the truth. To that we can only say, "Amen." In that context, Easter Sunday is a festival of hope. It is a belief that evil is ultimately punished, and that, even with all its worldly power, it can never stamp out the good. The only true question left is not whether evil will prosper, which it cannot, but whether each of us will be condemned as wicked, or reject the threats and temptations of demons.