Category: Discipleship

I was listening to a young man the other day talk about his journey to Christianity. As he began to discuss his life, I became overwhelmed at how God orchestrated events in his life to draw him to Himself. Though this man grew up in a country that is not so friendly to Christianity, God made a way for him to hear the gospel.

Listening to his story, I began thinking again about the growth of the early church and how God made a way for the gospel to spread in those early centuries. Though it is true that the disciples did face difficulties (read here), there were also several things that created a path for Christianity to grow.

Here are a couple of them…

First is the  pax Romana.  Some have suggested that Christianity would have been “inconceivable had Jesus been born a half century earlier.”[1] But due to the control of the world by one power, Christianity entered the world at a time of peace, the pax Romana.

One could travel throughout the entire Roman world by the roads built by the Romans with relative ease and peace from war. Robert Wilken writes that “never before had so many different peoples enjoyed such a measure of security and freedom of movement. As Rome conquered the world, it made the world welcome.”[2]

Second is the spread of the Greek language. While the pax Romana made the “world welcome,” the spread of the Greek language, after the conquests of Alexander the Great, “provided a common language for communication, trade, education, and intellectual life.”[3]

Theologian Michael Green places much emphasis on the Greek language and the spread of Christianity. He writes, “Greek was a sensitive, adaptable language, ideally suited for the propagation of a theological message, because for centuries it had been used to express the reflections of some of the world’s greatest thinkers, and thus had a ready-made philosophical and theological vocabulary.”[4]

Was it just a coincidence that Christianity emerged when it did? Or was it divine providence that prepared the world for the birth of Christianity?

Paul writes that “when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son” (Galatians 4:4). Some have held that this “fullness of time” refers to the items listed above, the pax Romana and the Greek language, and how they made it possible for the gospel to spread. Others believe that “fullness of time” is a specific time period that must be met.

PersonalIy, I think it’s easy to see how God worked in opening doors for the spread of the gospel in the first century. Regardless of how you view God’s sovereignty and days of old working together, we all can agree that God works and moves through history and events.

I write this way because of the story of the young man from the Middle East. Thought its mysterious, God apparently opened and closed certain opportunities for him which eventually, led him to a place to hear the gospel.

Paul asked the church in Colosse to pray for him “that God may open to us a door for the word” (Colossians 4:2). Paul seems to understand that it is God who makes a way for the gospel to spread.

Therefore, maybe we should not only see our salvation as by God’s grace, but also the opportunities we had to hear about it as well.

 

[1]Michael Green, Evangelism in the Early Church.
[2]Robert Wilken, The First Thousand Years.
[3]Wilken.
[4]Green.

 

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I believe that for those who claim to be Christian, discovering Christianity’s unique beginnings should be continually sought and made afresh with new understanding and study. Why? Because I think we will be encouraged and challenged.

This doesn’t mean you need to get a Ph.D. in the subject. Maybe you should just read a few things such as a blog post or two (consider what I have written about the growth of early Christianity over the past few days: day 1, day 2, day 3). Regardless of what you read, the book of Acts should never be left out.

One of the ways I think studying the early church will encourage us is that we will be reminded of the difficulties the early disciples had to overcome.

Consider what Michael Green wrote in Evangelism in the Early Church:

It was a small group of eleven men whom Jesus commissioned to carry on his work, and bring the gospel to the whole world. They were not distinguished; they were not educated; they had no influential backers. In their own nation they were nobodies and, in any case, their own nation was a mere second-class province on the eastern extremity of the Roman map.

If they had stopped to weigh up the probabilities of succeeding in their mission, even granted their conviction that Jesus was alive and that his Spirit went with them to equip them for their task, their hearts must surely have sunk, so heavily were the odds weighted against them. How could they possibly succeed? And yet they did. 

So what were some of the difficulties the early disciples faced?

• The early disciples were nobodies.
• They were seen as atheistic as they did not honor the customary gods.
• They were believed to be guilty of both incest and cannibalism. The reason for this is that they met in secret, spoke about feeding on Christ in the Eucharist, and spoke of each other as brothers and sisters in Christ.
• Their idea that Jesus’ death on the cross was the key to the wisdom of the ages was laughable.
• Their ethical lifestyle was not appealing.

      (see Chapter 2 in Evangelism in the Early Church)

Basically, “Christians were opposed as anti-social, atheistic, and depraved,” writes Green. “Their message proclaimed a crucified criminal, and nothing could have been less calculated than that to win them converts.”

And yet despite all of this, the message spread throughout the Roman Empire. Though the message of the cross was folly to those who were perishing, to those who were being saved it was the power of God (see 1 Corinthians 1:18).

What difficulties does the church face today? What difficulties do you personally face in sharing the gospel? Is it easy to get discouraged? If so, it will do us good to remember the early church and the hardships they overcame as the proclaimed the gospel–the gospel which is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek (Romans 1:16).

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So why did Christianity grow in the Roman Empire? In a world full of religious options and a plurality of gods, what was the attraction to Christianity?

As was written earlier, one attraction to Christianity was it’s treatment of women. Many have said that Jesus’ “attitude toward women was revolutionary as for him the sexes were equal.” So the early church, as it modeled Jesus, viewed men and women as equal as well.

But there is one more consideration as to why Christianity grew in the early centuries.  It is because Christians provided help and compassion for those in need. This is evidenced by the help Christians provided during the plagues (see chapter 4 in The Rise of Christianity by Rodney Stark).

In the early years, plagues tragically hit the Roman Empire. In 165, during the reign of Marcus Aurelius, a plague swept through the Roman Empire in which the mortality rate was so massive that Aurelius wrote of “caravans and wagons hauling out the dead.”[1]

Christians sought ways to help during the plagues as seen by a letter from Bishop Dionysius of Alexandria to those who had nursed the sick and to those who were giving their lives in doing so:

Most of our brothers showed unbounded love and loyalty, never sparing themselves and thinking only of one another. Heedless of danger they took charge of the sick, attending to their every need and ministering to them in Christ, and with them departed this life serenely happy; for they were infected by others with the disease, drawing on themselves the sickness of their neighbors and cheerfully accepting their pains. Many, in nursing and curing others, transferred their death to themselves and died in their stead…. The best of our brothers lost their lives in this manner, a number of presbyters, deacons, and laymen winning high commendation so that in death in this form, the result of great piety and strong faith, seems in every way the equal to martyrdom.[2]

Evidence of Christian’s helping others is not only found among  Christian writings however. In 362, the emperor Julian launched a campaign in order to help start pagan charities in order to match the Christians. In a letter to the high priest of Galatia, Julian urged the pagans that they needed to “equal the virtues of the Christians, for recent Christian growth was caused by their ‘moral character, even if pretended,’ and by their ‘benevolence toward strangers and care for the grave of the dead.”

In another letter Julian wrote, “I think that when the poor happened to be neglected and overlooked by the priests, the impious Galileans [Christians] observed this and devoted themselves to benevolence.”

Julian also wrote, “The impious Galileans [Christians] support not only their poor, but ours as well, everyone can see that our people lack aid from us.”[3]

So what can we learn from this? How important is it for us to be compassionate? Should not the church be in the midst of the suffering of the world?

Jesus said, You are the salt of the earth…. You are the light of the world…so let you light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven (Matt. 5:13-16).

 

 

[1]Rodney Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 116.
[2]Rodney Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 117.
[3]Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 84-84.

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