Rev. Schalk Strauss | 11 Sep 2025
A bullet flies with speed, with speed;
dampened by American blood it speeds,
bearing its message, sharp with pain;
it springs from American hand and vein,
it pierces through an American heart.
And yet with grief, with sorrow’s part,
it still conveys the heart’s own might.
Sleep gently, loyal heart struck tight,
For year on year, through time untold,
the bullet spreads its message bold;
and where it strikes, the wound won’t mend;
and what it strikes, it sanctifies in the end.
(Translated from the original Afrikaans poem)
With this small adaptation of the Afrikaans poet Jan F. E. Cilliers’s poem on the death of the Afrikaner rebel, Jopie Fourie, the emotions that now surge through the hearts of conservatives across the world find a voice. The assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk has sent shockwaves through America, and the tremors are felt to the ends of the earth. Though separated by worlds and more than a century, the parallels between Jopie Fourie and Charlie Kirk are striking. Both were branded as rebels because they refused to stay silent while injustice devoured the world. Their lives were marked by an unstoppable, unquenchable drive for truth. In both, the flame of freedom’s ideal burned high and bright. They were unyielding in character, unapologetically Christian, and (literally) “dead-sure” of their salvation in Jesus Christ.
Although many dismissed Kirk’s activism as politically motivated, a closer look reveals a deeper foundation. He did not shy away from the hot-button issues of our day. Freedom was, of course, at the top of his list, but it was never his only concern. Whether speaking about freedom of speech, abortion, same-sex relationships, fatherhood, discrimination, or cultural and social matters, his persuasiveness did not rest merely on logical skill or rhetorical flair – it rises from his foundation. Whenever he reasoned about these things, the echoes of Scripture and the gospel were present – often explicit. He measured his positions by an objective standard that lifted them above the staleness of secular discourse and gave them a heavenly fragrance. The Christian worldview was the lens through which he saw everything.
In 2012 he founded Turning Point USA to spread and advance conservative values. Yet “conservative values” to him were never merely a political category – they were synonymous with biblical values. The organisation’s name itself reflects his conviction that a course correction was urgently needed to avoid the catastrophic end of a woke, liberal-secular trajectory. His fight was never against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, the powers, the world forces of this darkness, the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places (Eph. 6:12). He was always aware that he himself was not the captain in charge of navigating such a turning point. He was only an instrument in the hand of the Spirit – the Spirit who alone can change hearts and bring life out of death. This was the turning point he most deeply longed for, when, only minutes before his death, he fearlessly declared: “Christ is Lord, death is defeated.”
In the second century after Christ, the church father Tertullian made this profound observation: “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.” Darkness will not extinguish the light of the gospel; the gates of hell will not prevail against it. May his fearless spirit live on in thousands of God’s children. May his seed also be blood-seed that sends the conservative tradition – rooted in the gospel, built on Christ the Cornerstone and the foundation of the apostles – like a flood across the world. May his message of freedom, grounded most deeply in Christ, bring the walls of Jericho crashing down. May it awaken in us the courage to rise and continue the fight for the kingdom. For this is a message that no cross and no bullet can ever silence!