Iran and Freedom

Seeing hundreds of thousands of people standing up to a tyrannical government uplifts all of us.    It resonates with our God-given love of freedom implanted in all our hearts.

Whether it was the students in Tienanmen Square, or the German people taking sledge hammers to the Berlin Wall, or the street dancing in Soweto when Nelson Mandela was released, or the citizens of Timosora, Romania who lit candles and chanted, “God is alive!” in the face of a secret police army, such images do not easily leave our minds.   It’s what we are beginning to see in Iran right now.

So when is a tyranny doomed?   When does such a government fall?    As I pondered the question, I came up with this answer:    When enough citizens are willing to die, and their willingness to die outweighs the tyranny’s willingness/ability to kill, then that government collapses.   As long as a government’s violence cows and scatters the assembled masses and people choose to save themselves, then that tyranny remains in place.

By this standard, events in Iran look promising.   At first the secret police and vigilante militias had the upper hand.  But by day two, with hundreds of thousands protesting, they sat off to the sidelines–stunned. Even one of their urban bases was overrun, which is why 7 people died.    The ruling Mullahs are trying to do what the Eastern European communists did–make concessions, diffuse the anger, and, above all, convince people to go home.   If threats don’t work, use bribes and make promises that won’t ever be kept.

In Eastern Europe, the concessions of the authorities only whetted the appetite of the repressed masses for freedom.   The protests got even bigger and soon the police and army saw which way the wind was blowing and joined the people.   In less than a week, these hated tyrannies fell.     Even wholesale concessions could not save them.

There is a spiritual parallel to this contest between the power of killing and the power of dying.    The power of Christ was released to us only when He chose to die in obedience to the Father at his enemy’s hands, instead of saving his own skin and making peace with the Pharisaic system.

And because they killed Him and released the power of dying, He arose and the number of His followers grew exponentially.   So the religious authorities responded with extreme violence. And the Church’s willingness to stand fast and even die thwarted their efforts to stamp out the movement.   Their power to kill was trumped again by the power of dying.

In Romania under communism, a secret police Colonel knocked on the door of Pastor Joseph Tson and announced, “Tomorrow we are going to kill you!”   The meek pastor responded, “Your greatest power is killing.   My greatest power is dying.   If you kill me, then every one who listens to my tapes will know that I died for what I believed.   They will listen that much harder and respond that much more, fulfilling my life’s work.   So I am very ready to die!”  The man returned the next day and said, “We are not going to kill you and release your greatest power!”

When there is no longer any threat tyrants can use to intimidate us into betraying what we know to be true, when there is no bribe they can give us to buy our disloyalty or denial, then and only then are we free.    Their power over us is broken.   We neither fear them nor do we need anything from them.  They cannot take away anything from us, nor can they add anything to us.

And so I wish the Iranian people well!   Not only freedom from government oppression.   But freedom from the tyranny of sin as well.    And both only happen because dying turns killing into victory.