A Controversial Hope
This is Pol Pot, leader of Khmer Rouge, one of history's most ruthless regimes…unbeknownst to most of the world.
In 1975, Pol Pot marched a host of teenage soldiers into Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, and seized control.
In no time Pol Pot evacuated the city, transformed a high school into prison and torture chambers, then began the genocide of his own people, cutting Cambodia off from the rest of the world, and extinguishing any form of capitalism and western influence. Teachers, doctors, lawyers, and government officials, were at the top of the list for torture and execution in his attempt to wipe out the educated and start society from "zero".
In the high school turned prison, Cambodians were put through horrors no one would dare to imagine. Beaten all day and then scrubbed in raw salt, for example. After weeks of torture, they were driven to the Killing Fields, some buried alive, machetes taken to their skulls, babies beaten against trees, women and children murdered in the droves. Millions upon millions.
Miraculously 7 men survived at the high school, still alive to tell their stories.
I visited the high school, now a museum, to pay my respects and learn of the culture where I now reside. Dumbfounded I stood as I met one survivor, Chum Mey. All i could think was "how can you stand to be here, this place where you suffered unimaginable horrors." He answered back with a smile, incapable of communicating through words due to language barriers. But it was evident that he more than survived, for Pol Pot had not broken his spirit. He signed my book and I left with my team.
We get in our tuk tuk (cab) and suddenly someone cries out "why didn't God just strike Pol Pot and the whole lot down!" Then immediately, before i could jump on the "fire and brimstone" bandwagon, the Holy Spirit said, "because there is still hope, even until our very last breath."
Jesus, on his journey to Jerusalem for crucifixion, was rejected by a Samaritan village, but when his disciples asked to call down fire on them Jesus responded, "you do not know what manner of spirit you are of…the Son of Man did not come to destroy lives but to save them." (Luke 9:51-56)
Christ came to save…ALL.
Who would dare go share the gospel with Pol Pot or Hitler had they survived?
Who would dare find it in their heart to look at these men with eyes of hope, as Christ looked at us in the midst of our sin?
Who would dare hope for James Holmes, the Colorado movie theater shooter? By the authority of Christ, would we save his soul, or cast him to the pit to "pay".
It is a question that I have to double think because my humanity hurts for the hurt and hates the hurter.
But the love of Christ is prevailing in my heart in an unconventional and controversial way: to hope for the bruised….. and the bruiser…that both would find mercy…that both would receive salvation for their souls.
