Christ Remains

While I was with them, I kept them in thy name, which thou hast given me; I have guarded them, and none of them is lost but the son of perdition, that the scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them thy word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I do not pray that thou shouldst take them out of the world, but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; thy word is truth. As thou didst send me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be consecrated in truth. John 17:12–19 (RSV)

Only those who have dwelt in a cave in recent times are unaware that Christianity is declining in Europe and North America. Fewer claim to be Christian now than at any other time in our nation's history.

It is not pleasing to hear, but it is not cause for desperate hand wringing. The Church has always been under assault by the world. Jesus prayed for his disciples that they might be kept in the Father's love as they remained in the world.

We remain in His love, for it is only the Father's love that will last. All the trappings of this world will one day be gone. They will be replaced by something else as it has been throughout the ages. So it will go, until the hour when the New Heaven and the New Earth come through our Risen Lord's return.

We continue to live the Truth, and in the Truth. We continue in our Lord. He it is who sustains and shelters us in the face of ever-increasing godlessness. We remain in Christ. The whole of creation may turn away, but we ask that we might continue steadfast in our Lord Jesus.