6/6/22

I recently heard an ancient historian, Tom Holland (no, not the Spiderman actor) say that he is basically a Christian except for one thing: he doesn’t believe in God. However, when he looks at his life and his fundamental way of living his life, he cannot escape the influence of Christ.

Most of us have grown up either in the Bible Belt or at least in homes with strong Christian influences, so it is easy for us to forget just how radically and miserably different our world would be without Christ.

One of the things about our modern society that drives me up the wall is the growing “victim” culture. We see it all the time in the news: the idea that to cast yourself in the role of a victim is to somehow give yourself power. This notion of “empowered victim” wouldn’t be possible at all in a culture untouched by Christianity. In Roman times, if someone said they were a victim, the response of anyone in any sort of power would be, “So what?” And then the victim would probably be further victimized. In non-Christian cultures today (by that I mean cultures with little or no Christian influence), a victim is just a victim.

I heard someone tell a horrendous story from one of their mission trips to China: while traveling through one of the inner provinces, the bus she was riding struck an elderly woman. To my friend’s horror, the bus driver calmly kept driving! Through her interpreter, the missionary asked the driver why he didn’t stop. He shrugged his shoulders and said, “Why should I? I can’t do anything to help her.” And drove on.

That was the causal attitude toward life in New Testament times. If someone got in the way, they got run over. And this was especially true if you were a woman or a slave. Lose one? Well, there’s plenty more where that one came from.

And it’s not like the gods were any help. Another atheist historian said the greatest innovation of Christianity was the notion that God – any god for that matter – had the capacity for love. No one would ever have sung, “Zeus loves me, this I know.” When Caesar proclaimed himself to be a god, people worshiped him in the hopes he would leave them alone, not as a response to Caesar’s love or because they loved Caesar. If the pagan gods were any help at all, it was because they either took a fancy to you or because you performed some sacrifice that kept them off your back, not because they loved you. If you were ugly or poor, you were out of luck as far as the gods were concerned.

And the notion of forgiveness? No one – not the gods, not Caesar, not your spouse, not the guy next door – was interested in forgiving anyone. If you paid them, or in the case of Caesar or the gods, made some sacrifice to them, they might look the other way, but there was no forgiveness. Forgiveness was a sign of weakness. Revenge was the order of the day, as it continues to be in non-Christian cultures.

Then along came Jesus.

Here was a victim of Roman “justice,” who used the power of Rome against itself. It really is incredible when you stop and think about it. The cross was Rome’s way of saying, “We run this world, and if you get in our way, we will torture you to death.” But now, because of Christ, the cross – the electric chair of its day – is transformed into a symbol of God’s all-conquering, self-giving love!

Through his death, Jesus demonstrated the love of God and offered forgiveness to literally anyone who asked for it. Anyone – Jew, Gentile, slave, free, male, female - could know the joy of being forgiven, of being refreshed by the love and mercy of God, of discovering new life and new purpose by following Christ. Neither Caesar nor the gods could offer anything even close to that!

So, imagine you were a slave hearing about this God of love for the first time. It must have been overwhelming for a slave to be told, “You are a child of God, and in God’s eyes, and in this body of believers, we are all equal.” Christianity called for a new relationship between master and slave that was unheard of at the time – a new relationship that would eventually bring the end of slavery. Slaves were no longer just property; they were brothers and sisters, equal in the eyes of God.

Imagine if you were a woman hearing about this God of love for the first time. Suddenly, women are valued! In Greek society, men and women were almost different species, but Christianity changed all that. Under Christianity, women were no longer the property of their fathers who at marriage were transferred to the guardianship of their husbands. They were no longer merely managers of a household. Christianity called for a mutual love and care for husbands and wives that had never been seen anywhere in the world before. Every time you enjoy the simple act of sitting down with your family at dinner and discussing the events of the day, thank God for making it possible.

How was all this change possible? Through agape, love. The world was transformed by the love demonstrated by God when He gave His one and only Son to die for the most unlovable.

We’re so comfortable in our Christian stew that we forget just how revolutionary Christianity is! But it is a revolution! It’s a clash of kingdoms. That’s why we talk about a Messiah (an anointed King), and the Kingdom of God. That’s why we say, “Jesus is Lord.”

And that’s why Rome wanted to stamp Chrisianity out. That’s why the Jewish leaders, as we’ll see over the next weeks in Acts, imprisoned, beat and even killed the believers. That’s why Satan has a hissy fit when we care for the poor, treat one another fairly, forgive one another, forgive someone who hasn’t even asked for it . . . in other words, when we love like Christ loved us.

We can’t take all this for granted. Nor can we allow the politics of the world to demean, mischaracterize or rob us of the wonderful legacy that is ours because of the world-changing, all encompassing love of God. It’s a revolution to recreate the world! And God has invited us to enlist and help turn our upside down world rightside up.

Loving God . . . loving others. It’s really quite revolutionary when you think about it.

Blessings,
Pastor Terry