How Much Are You Willing to Endure for the Sake of Truth?

In our modern age of compromise it has become fashionable to speak in such phrases as “your truth” and “my truth.” These words sound tolerant and enlightened, but they carry an emptiness. If truth can be bent and reshaped by every person’s opinion, it loses all weight, all power, and all authority. But when truth matters so much that you would risk your very life for it—when it becomes the line you will not cross—you begin to recognize that truth must be something more absolute. Something solid. Something eternal.

That reality came into sharp focus in Zambia, where I serve. Our mission team had been invited into a village that had, for more than 100 years, never permitted a Protestant Christian gathering. Those who had tried before us were beaten, driven out, or even killed. The last attempt had ended in humiliation—no one dared to attend for fear of violent retribution.

Time for a Change

But in God’s providence, change came. The long-standing religious leader of the region went on a journey and was tragically killed in a vehicular accident. With a shift in leadership, a small window opened, and into that fragile space our team stepped to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ—the truth that sets captives free.

Night after night, under the dim glow of a few bulbs from a generator, villagers gathered. Among them was a quiet teenage girl named Lushomo. She came faithfully, listened intently, taking in the Word of God, her heart opening to the voice of the Spirit. When the call for baptism came, her hand went up with quiet but determined courage.

A Violent Reaction

The team arranged to meet her family on Friday, knowing that baptism was scheduled for Sabbath morning. As they approached her humble home, they prayed for favor. But the reception was far from warm. Her parents, confused and alarmed by the visit, demanded an explanation. When they learned of their daughter’s decision, their reaction was immediate and violent.

Shouting erupted. They dragged the girl inside, their voices sharply cutting the air:

“What is wrong with our religion?”

Thud. Thud.

“What is wrong with our religion!”

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The blows fell hard and heavy. Through the shouting, muffled cries could be heard. The team stood outside, helpless. Night came, and they left with heavy hearts, wondering if they would ever see Lushomo alive again—and if she was, surely the fire in her heart had been extinguished by such fierce opposition.

No Matter the Cost

God, however, was at work.

The next morning the team walked to the baptismal site—a deep, cool stream flowing like life itself through the parched, sun-scorched savannah. The air was already hotter than 38°C (100°F), but the water promised refreshment. As they approached, they stopped in shock.

There, already standing in the water, was Lushomo. Her body bore the marks of the previous night’s brutality—bruised, battered, but unbroken. Her eyes, bright with something greater than pain: conviction. She had counted the cost and made her choice. Whatever the price, she would follow Jesus.

She was the first to be baptized that morning. As she came up from the water, her face radiant, one could not help feeling that, like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the fiery furnace, she was not alone. The Savior had been with her during the long night and was now with her in the waters, sharing her suffering, sealing her testimony.

It was a solemn moment. A moment that pierced through all the talk of “relative truth” and “personal truth.” For here stood a young girl who had discovered the truth—truth not subject to opinion or compromise, but incarnate in the living Christ, who still bids His followers, “Come and die.”

And yet, amazingly, it is in that dying that we find life!

Craig Harding is executive director at Riverside Farm Institute, a lay-led supporting ministry of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.