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Lessons From the Early Church

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05/20/2010 | Steve Wingfield

Historian Will Durant says, “There is no greater drama in human record that the sight of a few Christians, scorned or oppressed by a succession of emperors, bearing all trials with a fierce tenacity, multiplying quietly, building order while their enemies generate chaos, fighting the sword with the word, brutality with hope, and, at last, defeating the strongest state that history has known. Caesar and Christ had met in the arena, and Christ had won”

 
In A.A. 260, a great epidemic hit Europe. At its height, five thousand people a day were reported to have died in the city of Rome alone. How did this growing multitude of Christians respond at this unique moment I history? What was their common mission and how did it add greater meaning and a sense of purpose to their lives?
 
Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, wrote the following as a tribute to the early Christians who had devoted themselves to the care of the sick and dying. “Most of our brother Christians 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. The best of our brothers lost their lives in this manner…winning high commendation so that death in this form, the result of great piety and strong faith, seems in every way the equal of martyrdom.”
 
Think about it! This band of believers actually toppled the greatest civilization of its day, the Roman Empire. It has been said that this was accomplished because the early church out-thought, out-lived and out-died everyone around them. Some historians refer to the first 300 years of church history as the greatest social movement of all time; the rise of Christianity!
 
What has happened to us since then? The results of a recent George Barna survey of the un-churched in North America tell us that something is wrong. According to his research, un-churched people view Christians (the church) as boring, judgmental, hypocrites! They don’t like us and they don’t want what we are offering. How have we gotten so far from the passion of the early church?
 
I have been musing over this quite some time and asking myself how the church can change this perception. My suggestion is not a new program but a new social order! This new order or movement must begin with me. It must begin with you. We must not only begin asking the question, what would Jesus do? We must start doing what Jesus did!
 
If we are to become a movement, it will require a multitude of people, at this unique moment in history, with a common mission to experience and exhibit greater meaning in our lives.
 
We, the church, are a professing multitude! This is our moment in history! We may not be called upon to physically die, but we all have been called to serve this generation. What will history record about the results of our mission? Are you representing Christ in the way you live? Is your involvement producing greater meaning and are you living life with a sense of purpose?
 
Remember II Corinthians 4: 7, which says, “But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.”
 
Remember, it is our responsibility and opportunity to represent Him well wherever we go and in whatever we do!
 
“Only one life to live and it will soon be past, only what is done for Christ will last”
Author Unknown
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