When faced with the realities of genocidal states and suicide bombers, how do we persevere? If we believe in a God of justice, why does he allow such injustice, and how do we know he will make all things right?

Cecil is CSW’s South Asia Deputy Team Leader. Reflecting on his first-hand experience growing up as a Christian in Pakistan, here he offers some thoughts on a heavenly perspective on justice.

We all know that feeling. We read a story of terrible injustice, or perhaps we experience something in our own lives, and in that moment the world just seems too cruel, too unjust.

 Growing up as a Christian in Pakistan, I saw injustice all around me. In one famous case in 2009 Asia Bibi, a Christian mother of four, was arrested and later sentenced to death under the blasphemy laws. All she was guilty of was offering a cup of water to a colleague.

At that time my dear friend Shahbaz Bhatti, Pakistan’s Federal Minister for Minorities Affairs, spoke out strongly against the misuse of the blasphemy laws, despite the knowledge this would make him a target for extremists.

One of my darkest days was 2 March 2011, when Shahbaz was assassinated outside his mother’s home. His government did not protect him and no one has ever been brought to justice for his death. I wondered what hope is there, when our boldest, most brilliant voice can be snuffed out without consequence?

Two things have kept me going. First, the example of my father, who was a human rights activist and war hero. No matter what the consequences, what the odds, he never gave up. I think we all need those examples in our lives, people whose very spirit can pick us up when we are weary from the fight. Even in his final battle against cancer, he would laugh and joke with the other chemotherapy patients, keeping up their morale and his. The death of our bodies is the battle we can never win and yet he fought it all the way, with courage and dignity.

Second, I find great hope in knowing that God seems to delight in changing the hardest heart. When I think of the gunmen who killed Shahbaz, I remember that God chose the murderer and persecutor Saul to bring the gospel to so many.

In Matthew 25 Jesus promises a final judgment where the wicked ‘will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.’ Revelation 21 promises that God will make a new heavens and a new earth where he will dwell with us, and ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain.’

To me these are snapshots of God’s eternal perspective; that He will both judge justly (and who am I to say who will make it into His kingdom?) and create a new, just world.

I still have moments when I feel hopeless – it’s impossible to do this work and not feel that way. But I trust God. I remember to stay hopeful and that, despite the extremists’ efforts, Asia Bibi is today alive and free. And I keep going.