Do Not Grow Weary in Doing Good

Editorial

by

Perspectives

A United Methodist Insight Editorial | Aug. 26, 2025

Evil runs rampant in the United States of America these days. Those with means, or with a loved one threatened by the current federal administration’s policies and practices, are leaving this country for other lands. Those of us who haven’t the means to escape spend our days resisting our collective fear of what new outrage may be coming.

We wonder, in the words of scripture, how then shall we live?

Daily we’re tempted to succumb to one of two evils – the apathy of despair or the violence of hatred. The struggle to stand up for good while resisting evil elicits widespread conversation on social media. Some say it’s time to use the enemy’s tactics against them.

In this time of trial, those who would practice good are up against those for whom malevolence is justified.

In his Aug. 26 Substack post, “No Wonder Trump Supporters Think Empathy is ‘Toxic,’” Dr. Jemar Tisby laid out scientific research for why conservative Christians have embraced the cruel activities of the federal administration. He summarized the findings thus: “The researchers point out that malevolence and its opposite, benevolence, exist on a continuum — all of us have a bit of both. But Trump supporters consistently lean hard toward the malevolent side.”

Dr. Tisby concludes: “Can people really delight in cruelty? Are the ICE abductions, vindictive lawsuits, and wanton displays of violence actually enticing to some? The science says, ‘Yes.’”

How then are today’s followers of Jesus to live? The answer that many spiritual leaders give seems not only countercultural but counter-intuitive and counter-productive: live as Jesus taught and modeled and be prepared to pay a high price for it.

Make no mistake: this is not a bleeding-heart liberal, “snowflake” response. To resist the impulse to fight back with violence, to speak truth to power in dangerous situations, requires strength, commitment and courage that many of us don’t think we have.

Yet like athletes preparing for a challenge, we can develop these abilities.

For instance, take volunteer Tim Murphy, who accompanies people to immigration court. In a moving account, “The Heartbreak, Rage — and Discipline — of Immigration Court Watching,” for The Marshall Project, Murphy must calmly prepare immigrants to face masked ICE agents. “You’re witnessing unspeakable cruelty, but you can’t lash out,” he writes.

The Marshall Project graciously granted Insight permission to republish Murphy’s full account of watching immigration court proceedings. His descriptions are chilling and maddening, but they are also inspiring. Murphy shows that even amid such cruelty, simple acts of kindness – speaking to someone in a language they understand, letting them know they are not alone – can have beneficial long-term effects on both immigrant and onlooking enforcers.

The same is true of Jesus’ instruction on how to deal with our impulse toward retaliation and cruelty in Matthew 5:38-48 (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition).

Concerning Retaliation

38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ 39 But I say to you: Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also, 40 and if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, give your coat as well, 41 and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. 42 Give to the one who asks of you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.

Love for Enemies

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be children of your Father in heaven, for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the gentiles do the same? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Surely, we say, this approach won’t work today. We forget that Jesus gave these teachings to the Jews as cunning ways to resist the Roman Empire’s edicts and behaviors while maintaining their dignity and safety. (My personal favorite is the counsel to “go a second mile.” Roman soldiers could force oppressed people to carry their heavy packs for one mile, but going a second mile opened them to military discipline, which was far more injurious than peeling potatoes for Army KP.)

ICE and other officers don’t force us to walk a mile, but we can put obstacles in their way without violence. A meme on social media right now urges us white people to use our privilege to confront immigration enforcers nonviolently. We do this by announcing their presence and by reminding everybody they have the right to remain silent, not to answer questions without an attorney, to see officers’ badges and warrants, and to know what “reasonable cause” officers cite for detaining them. Putting ourselves in that gap, reminding one another that we yet have constitutional rights, resisting without violence, has caused agents to leave a vicinity.

We may yet need to shed our blood in defense of democracy and of our Christian faith that has been perverted to sanction the current regime’s heinous crimes. However, until that day arrives, everything we can do to resist nonviolently has the potential to keep bloodshed from happening.

Eager as we may be to storm the barricades in revolutionary fashion, wiser folks among us know – as Jesus did in his day – that many times armed resistance leads those drawn to cruelty to enact even more malevolence. We may yet need to shed our blood in defense of democracy and of our Christian faith that has been perverted to sanction the current regime’s heinous crimes. However, until that day arrives, everything we can do to resist nonviolently has the potential to keep bloodshed from happening.

None of this is easy; it hurts. We hurt for the most vulnerable and sometimes we get hurt ourselves. We who lean toward compassion, as Dr. Tisby describes, want to ease the pain of others, and we feel frustration, even revulsion, when we are unable to do so.

We can see parallels between our time and what it must have been like for the few followers who accompanied Jesus to the cross, watching him die a horrible death while being unable to stop it. Indeed, the Crucifixion has happened every day for millennia but we closed our eyes to it. Now we can’t avoid seeing it, and we’re unprepared for the changeable, complex ways in which we must respond.

As we sharpen our perceptions so that we can know when and how to do good in evil's midst, we can be sustained by this wisdom: in the cosmic calculus, every act of good serves to counterbalance an act of evil. The more good we do in the world, the more evil we reject. The more good we do, the more people see that hatred, prejudice, and violence only deal death, while the way of community and compassion – Jesus’ way – leads to abundant life for all.

“So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up.” – Galatians 6:9

Cynthia B. Astle serves as Editor of United Methodist Insight, an online news-and-views journal she founded in 2011 as a media channel to amplify the voices of marginalized and under-served United Methodists.