Silver Street Mission
2004: January
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Facing Opposition
Mark 13: 1 - 23
Rev. Peter R Green, Sunday morning, 04 Jan,
2004
All design
and contents (c)
Peter R Green
2002
Note:
This sermon refers to two
overhead slides, one showing the escalation of destruction of Christian
churches in Indonesia, the other showing the increased rate of major
earthquakes since 1976.
These slides are not reproduced
here, but may be made available later.
AROUND THE year 320AD, Christianity suffered a blessing from which it has never completely recovered. It became an officially–recognised religion of the Roman Empire.
Not all blessings are what they are cracked up to be. Vika and Linda sing a song with the words,
Be careful what you pray for
You just might get it...
Even a decade before this dramatic
change in the church’s fortunes, persecution of believers
was still common. Suddenly, the church was official, and pagans
were second-class.
And the church forgot how to be persecuted.
Jesus said,
MT 5:10 Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11 “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. 12 Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you."
There is blessing in being in opposition, in being outcasts, in being a persecuted minority.
When Jeff Kennett came to power
in Victoria, he so comprehensively defeated the Labor Party that
commentators lamented the lack of an effective opposition.
At
that time, the Government was strongly into casinos and other vice,
and two men, Catholic bishop George Pell and Baptist pastor Tim
Costello, spoke against them.
The papers called the churches
“the defacto Opposition” in Victoria. That was
no criticism. It was a vote of approval. Someone had to stand against
Kennett, or his Government would do whatever it liked.
I have been on the sharp end
of politicians' ire, from both the Labor and the Liberal camps,
and it is no fun. A politician crossed is a thug of the first order.
And there were a few thugs in the Victorian Cabinet at the time,
so I’m sure that Costello and Pell felt what anti-Christian
abuse is like.
In the world of the early Christians, there was
no Opposition at all. The idea of opposing the Government and living
to tell about it was foreign to most people. But Christians declared
God as the supreme ruler over Israel — and had sent Jesus
as the Messiah to put that rule into effect. They said, “Jesus
-- not Caesar -- is Lord!” Christians confronted the authorities
and powers of this world. That was the basic reason for persecution.
And that was part of the reason why the Church grew so astoundingly
in those days. Where kings and emperors and caesars asserted their
power and their vision of reality, Christians said there is a greater
power to which all must answer, there is a more true reality which
all will eventually see, there is an assured future in which no
earthly power plays a role.
Them’s fighting words.
Once the Church became official,
it became safe, it became rich, it became part of the world’s
power systems, and it lost its muscle.
Even today, when very
few countries have an established, official church, we still live
as though we have a right. We still live as though the world should
listen to us and do it our way. But we don’t ask them
to listen to Jesus. We give them rules for morality, but we don't
give them the inner life of Christ.
I believe that the Christian church faces its greatest challenges in this century. I have recently remarked that an American Jewish Civil Liberties Lawyer says that Christians will become the Jews of the 21s Century. I believe that that is a very likely scenario.
On Christmas day, I said that Christianity
faces three great challenges today. I said that it faces the challenge
of secularism. I said it faces the challenge of immorality. I said
it faces the challenge of Islam. I said we must be prepared —
prepared to act out of defenseless weakness, not out of defensive
power.
Each of those challenges comes determined to impose its
power on the world and determined to overthrow any opposition. Each
of them knows that Christianity is the most potent opposition it
has. Each is determined to overthrow Christianity.
Jesus and his disciples came to Jerusalem, and sat looking at the splendour of the Temple. Jesus warned them,
MK 13:2 “Do you see all these great buildings?” [...] “Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.”
That prophecy became true in 70AD,
when the Romans finally tired of Jewish opposition and terrorism,
and destroyed the Temple so the Jews would have no rallying point.
So the disciples wanted to know when these things would happen,
because this was about 30AD, so the destruction of the Temple was
still 40 years away.
The disciples assumed that destruction of the Temple must mean the Day of Judgement. They could imagine no worse catastrophe.
Jesus’ reply was in several
parts.
First he talks of religio–political events
on an international scale. Then he talks about religious persecution
on a more local level Finally, he talks about evil seemingly gaining
the upper hand.
However, these are only the preliminaries. Before
the judgment comes there are more signs, not just worldwide strife,
but a shaking of the entire cosmic system.
The reason for this break–up is that Jesus’ reply covers two questions, the spoken one about the destruction of the Temple, and the more implicit one about the Return of Christ and the Day of Judgment.
So international strife, local persecution and the triumph of evil were specific signs of the coming destruction of the Temple, but they were also general signs of the Last Days and of the coming times of trial and tribulation before Jesus comes again.
INTERNATIONAL STRIFE
Jesus speaks of this in three different
aspects: the spiritual realm, the political realm and the natural
realm. Though, in fact, each is intertwined with the others.
Spiritual
In the spiritual realm, it is marked by an upsurge
in false religions. In the times before the fall of the Temple,
there were several false Messiahs, promising deliverance to the
Jews.
In the same way, we see false religions flourishing today.
The Mormons are a major cult, preaching polytheism and an America–centred view of salvation. They have had a much greater impact on American culture than many people realise, because they picked up a little piece of coloured rubber dragging off the feet of American Christianity and blew it up into a gigantic, splendid balloon of idolatry, and then the other religions said, “That is ours!” and tried to take it back. It is idolatry of America and American ways, and it permeates a lot of the folk culture of that nation. As American influence soaks across the world, so does the thinking of Mormonism.
Scientology taps into the anti-God self–sufficiency and the pop psychology of the Western World. It promises spirituality without God. It allows no opposition, and viciously attacks its opponents.
Islam combines elements of both. It claims to supersede Christianity and Judaism, it has its own book and, in its extreme manifestations, it takes no prisoners.
Buddhism, like Scientology, tries to be spiritual without God. The selfless impulse of the Buddha too often becomes a totally self–absorbed revolt against God and his ways.
All these, and many more, compete
for hearts and minds today, offering a caricature of the truth as
it is found in Jesus.
But the world has no way to tell what
is real and what is not. It suspects that the logical positivists
are right, that no religious statement has any real meaning, that
it is all just a matter of feelings and impulses. The world says,
“If you want to be religious, pick whatever grabs you,
and use it as you want to.”
Jesus warned,
False Christs and false prophets will appear and perform signs and miracles to deceive the elect -- if that were possible. 23 So be on your guard...
The corresponding problem is that anti-Christian feeling is growing world-wide. The graphic on the overhead reveals just a scrap of the problem -- the growing number of attacks on Christian churches in Indonesia. But it happens around the world, particularly in areas which some people consider are part of Hindu or Muslim territory.
Political
Then there are wars and rumours of wars —
nations rising against nations and kingdoms against kingdoms.
The upheavals before 70AD were significant, but nowhere near the scale of today’s upheavals. Since the late 1960s, the world has faced terrorism from the Red Brigades, from the Black Octoberists, from Hamas, and, increasingly, from Al Quaeda and its offshoots, not to mention the Moro Liberation Front in The Philippines.
Then there is State-sponsored terror,
such as Lybia was famous for, such as Iraq exported to the world’s
trouble spots, such as the US and Israel have honed to a fine edge.
The worst is that nations which should know better have been among
the most ruthless practitioners.
Natural
And there are earthquakes and famines and such events.
The incidence of severe earthquakes rose dramatically in the last
quarter of the 20th Century. The graphic shows how few earthquakes
there were between 1923 and 1976 and how often they have occurred
since.
The world is in turmoil. Scientists
are warning of another El Niño event in Australia, and we
still are not fully over the last one. That’s pretty unusual.
There have been hotter than usual summers in the Northern Hemisphere,
and unprecedented bushfires. Bob Carr warned last week that our
current water restrictions are the first effects of global warming,
and we will have to expect more effects to follow.
Afghanistan
suffered cripping drought for years under Taliban rule, and the
drought broke when that rule was overthrown.
We can’t
say that the two are connected, but it should at least force us
to ask whether our water problems have a spiritual cause.
THE PROMISE OF PERSECUTION
And I want us to reflect on this. These
things have always been with us, and are general signs that we are
in the last days, as we have been since Pentecost. They are also
signs which will escalate as the Day comes nearer. But one effect
of such distress is that people will seek scapegoats, and Christians
will be blamed.
I heard George Negus, who is usually pretty balanced, claim recently on TV that most wars have been caused by religion. That is absolute, unmitigated nonsense. Yes, some wars have had a religious basis, but even they were as much about economics and territory as about religion itself. It is a particularly unjust comment when it comes to Christianity, though we Christians are certainly not blameless.
But Christians make a convenient scapegoat. We are a judgment to the world whenever we choose to live Christ’s way and not the world’s way. We seem to hold unjustifiable beliefs. Other religions seem to have a sensible list of rules to keep and a credible god to believe in; we have faith instead of works, and we have a God who doesn’t seem to add up. and Jesus warned,
MK 13:9 You will be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogues. On account of me you will stand before governors and kings as witnesses to them. 10 And the gospel must first be preached to all nations. 11 Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit.
MK 13:12 “Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child. Children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. 13 All men will hate you because of me, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.
FOLLOWING TO THE END
We can expect things to get worse, but
whoever stands firm to the end will be saved. We have that promise
from our Lord himself.
He also tells us,
...those will be days of distress unequaled from the beginning, when God created the world, until now -- and never to be equaled again. 20 If the Lord had not cut short those days, no one would survive. But for the sake of the elect, whom he has chosen, he has shortened them.
I don’t want anyone to say, “I never knew.” Our situation is like that of Britain in 1940, facing the spread of German aggression: The Prime Minister told Parliament,
“I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat. We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many, many months of struggle and suffering.”
We can not expect to remain long exempt from suffering in the name of Jesus our Lord. But he has gone before us. He has endured the shame and the suffering of the cross. He gave his life as a substitute for you and for me. How can we let him down? How could we possibly walk away from identification with him?
Jesus says,
If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.
The way of Jesus is not the way of
leisure and luxury, but the way of suffering, persecution and even
of death. But it is the only way that leads to life, and few there
are who find it.
Jesus calls us today: he wants our allegiance
and our faith. He calls us to himself, so that he might indwell
us and direct us and transform the world through us.
Has he spoken to you?
Then let
us do as he has said,
and his blessing will be with you for
ever more,
AMEN
© Peter R. Green 2002. Permission is granted for quotation in full for non-commercial purposes provided that authorship is acknowledged and this copyright notice is displayed with the text.