This prompted me to review and again consider a quote I have on my wall from Rand's epic Atlas Shrugged -- a quote I've often drawn inspiration from:
"In the name of the best within you, do not sacrifice this world to those who are its worst. In the name of the values that keep you alive, do not let your vision of man be distorted by the ugly, the cowardly, the mindless in those who have never achieved his title. Do not lose your knowledge that man's proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads. Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it's yours."
Today this quote gives me pause as a Christian. It is from the character John Galt and comes toward the end of his famous 70 page speech. The language is empowering, particularly in my line of work fighting constant uphill battles. Given Rand's atheism, though, it also denies the Biblical truth that we as Christians will never fully prevail in this world until Christ reigns again. So the world we desire actually is not possible here...right??
2 comments:
In response, I'll trade you one of my favorite quotes for yours:
“Eschatology means the doctrine of the Christian hope… From first to last, and not merely in the epilogue, Christianity is eschatology, is hope, forward looking and forward moving, and therefore also revolutionizing and transforming the present.”
-- Jurgen Moltmann Theology of Hope
The last part is key, I think. While none of us can bring about the worldwide reality of Christian hope, we can probably do much more in our own local world than we realize. You go to work every day to demand justice for the oppressed, for example - the same thing most of the Hebrew prophets demanded of their hearers.
In that light, Galt's line is pretty similar: "In the name of the best within you, do not sacrifice this world to those who are its worst."
There's a reason Rand portrayed Galt as a Christ-figure. The difference is that Christ worked actively revolutionized His world.
Galt simply left.
I agree with Frank - as my pastor John Ortberg says, we're in the business of "bringing up there down here".. (check out his sermon on that from Sept. 18, 2005 - it's great :) http://data.mppc.org/sermon/transcript/050918_jortberg_tr.pdf)
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