Welcome back, friends! After a long, relaxing summer, I’m happy to be back on the blog, sharing with you all snippets of history and encouragement. And today, for my first column back, I thought I’d share a little bit of both. 🙂

Eighty-six years ago this month, German bombers began an assault on mainland England known as the Blitz. For eight unbearably long months, Luftwaffe planes conducted mass air attacks against industrial targets, civilians, and towns, including the bombing of London for fifty-six straight days, as well as other strategic cities such as Liverpool, Bristol, and Glasgow, as well as Birmingham, Coventry, Manchester, and Sheffield. More than 40,000 civilians were killed by these raids, almost half of them in the capital, where more than a million houses were destroyed or damaged.

But, just as iconic as the images of devastation are the memories of British resolve. Night after night after night, weary citizens steeled themselves for the attacks but refused to capitulate to German demands. While thousands of citizens sought shelter in basements and bomb shelters, hundreds more heeded Churchill’s proclamation of ‘To the roofs!’ instead. The prime minister was imploring people to help save London by venturing out during the raids to stop fires before they began to burn out of control, sparing homes, businesses, and historic landmarks in an effort to salvage both livelihoods and morale.

“Many became adept,” remembers Alan Paton, noted South African author, “and thousands of fires were extinguished before they took hold. The experience of remaining on the roof night after night under fire, with no protection but a tin hat, became habitual.”

Venturing onto the roof was dangerous. Perhaps even a little crazy. But these courageous Britons recognized that personal safety counted for little in the grand scheme of things. Their homes, their country, their very way of life was at stake. They might not have been able to take down German planes, but they could minimize the damage they inflicted and bring hope to their fellow man.

We may not live in a place where we are threatened with a nightly barrage of bombs or missiles, but sometimes we can all be tempted to “hide in the basement” of our lives, hunkered down against the fires, explosions, and the dangers of both our lives and the world at large. We can choose to retreat from adversity, seeking safety–be it physical, emotional, or mental. And, while this isn’t always a bad thing, the problem arises when we opt to stay in the basement permanently, disconnecting from the world, too afraid to emerge from our cocoon. While sometimes this may be a physical withdraw, more often it’s an escape into anger, bitterness, hatred, or even apathy.

And I get it. Even if you’re not being bombed into smithereens, the world is a scary place. But, as Christians, I don’t believe it’s in our best interest–or God plan’s for us–to hide in the basement as the world goes down in flames.

Instead, I believe we should be the first ones up on the roof.

Paton, who endured persecution and hostility in his home country of South Africa, believed this too, praying often to be a “healing stream [that] may flow into the river of hate.”

As believers, Jesus supplies us with “living water,” the likes of which give us the power to overcome evil and hate and strife. But we cannot use that if we are too scared to emerge from our basements and use it! We are called to be different, to live lives, not for ourselves, but for God and for others. Be bold in faith, friends. Be courageous.

Be firefighters.

As Paton prayed, “Lord, save us from a retreat into hatred or despair. Call us out of the shelters and send us up to the roofs, even if day and night we are under fire. May we remain calm in the midst of violence and panic, and may reason and love and mercy and understanding rule our lives.”

To the roofs, friends.

Our world needs it.