We have enjoyed, as followers of Jesus, unprecedented freedom that most Christians throughout the world as well as history have never known. It would be naïve to think this unusual freedom will last forever, so how do we sustain faith in an increasingly hostile world? One of the ways that God uses our persecution for His glory is by our extending compassion to people that the world says we should resent. This is the example Jesus set for us on the cross when He prayed, “Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”