De Opresso Liber is the motto of the US Army Special Forces. It is a latin phrase that means, “Liberate the Oppressed”. The phrase originated during WWII when Colonel Aaron Bank and his Special Forces teams enabled the oppressed French Resistance to grow and eventually oppose and overthrow the occupying German Army.
Similarly, it is the duty of Christians to become special forces in an oppressed world… to enable the lost to stage a resistance against the Oppressor through the power of Christ.
Augustine wrote the following, which he described as the mission of the church:
The turbulent have to be corrected,
The faint-hearted cheered up,
The weak supported;
The Gospel’s opponents need to be refuted,
Its insidious enemies guarded against;
The unlearned need to be taught,
The indolent stirred up,
The argumentative checked;
The proud must be put in their place,
The desperate set on their feet,
Those engaged in quarrels reconciled;
The needy have to be helped,
The oppressed to be liberated,
The good to be encouraged,
The bad to be tolerated;
All must be loved.
In Isaiah 1:17, the Lord declares, “Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.” just before underscoring the statement with the invitation to, “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool”.
Such a powerful admonition to those who would call themselves the redeemed… “liberate the oppressed”. De Opresso Liber.