America is lost more than a man this week. We lost a voice that made one of the most best American acts imaginative: to debate peacefully in the public category.
Charlie Kirk was not engaged in violence. He was not conspiring for destruction. He was doing something that has been in the heart of our national identity since the establishment of this Republic – the exchange of attitude with fellow citizens in enthusiastic conversations.
This is why his murder is cut so deeply. This was not just an attack on a conservative or a Christian leader. This was an attack on the very theory of free speech – the foundation stone of Liberty.
Isaiah reads 1:18, “Come now, and give us the argument together,” Isaiah reads 1:18. This invitation is both divine and democratic. God invited us to bring our brothers and sisters peacefully to bring our disagreement and differences. In the same way, our nation was formed on the basis that we can come together, challenge each other’s views, and live in neighboring, civil and fellow Americans.
When I talk to my congregation on Sunday morning, I am blessed to say independently that I consider my heart right and true in my heart. When I take an interview or when someone challenges my faith or my attitude, I have the right to say what is on my heart, as any person who disagrees with me.
What happened in Utah was opposed to him. Instead of arguing together, someone chose to end the conversation with violence. Instead of persuasion, he reached for a weapon. It was not just a political murder, but an attack on American experiment.
For generations, our colleges and universities have forums where ideas are tested, intensified, and sometimes uprooted. Today, they have become a place to hand, canceled, or follow by a mob. And if disagreement becomes the basis for murder, none of us is safe. The entire way of our life begins to reveal the moment when we cannot sit in a lecture hall, a campus lawn, or a city square and talk about our mind without fear of being silent with a bullet.
The first amendment was written right for this reason. Freedom of speech is not only the right to agree with popular ideas; It has the right to give voice to the unpopular. This question is to instigate, even insult. Without that freedom, we get into torture – where only the most strong student or the greatest worker decides what can be spoken.
Kirk understood that. He spent his career in dialogue to confuse young people, challenged them to think, and encouraged them to stand firm in their belief. Whether someone agrees with him or not, he was committed to the US promise that the debate is not dangerous, but necessary.
Today, after killing an innocent husband and father, we face a cold question: will we allow violence to define our discourse? Will we allow fear to control our speech? If so, yesterday, the trigger -pulled killer succeeded in over -ending a man’s life – he ended the freedom of every and every American.
We cannot allow this to happen. Now more than ever, we should recommend ourselves simple but intensive truth that disagreement is not hate. If we cannot learn to argue without violence, then our Republic will not survive.
Our nation was born in debate. The continental Congress was a long debate as to what freedom means. Constitutional Conference was a collection of topical disagreements that eliminated our basic documents. Even within the church, the inspired Paul in his letter writes to “speak the truth in love” in his letter. We intensify each other through dialogue, not through death and destruction.
Any respectable, royal person should mourn Kirk’s death today. And the best way to respect his death is to re -write himself for freedom used on his last day – freedom of speech. We can cure our wounds by sitting shoulder to shoulder, which we disagree, listen to them, argue with them, and show the world that Americans are not afraid of debate. We hug it.
Kirk’s voice has been silenced, but his death should not silence the principle he incarnated.
Pastor Gentezen Franklin is a Bestseling writer who is a senior pastor of the Free Chapel and the founder of the Gentezen Franklin Media Ministries. He was recently appointed to President Trump’s Religious Freedom Commission.
