PERSECUTION

“All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field... but the Word of the Lord stands forever.”

1 Peter 1:24, 25

There is a new job opening in our company, and you have both experience and education. But another person gets the job. It was a management decision, you are told, but a friend says your colleagues resent that you don’t drink with the guys. You are a doctor and because of your Christian convictions, you refuse to participate in certain billing practices that you view as dishonest. Your colleagues shun and make comments behind your back.

It’s the real world but it is also a form of hostility which believers have endured for a long time. As early as A.D. 65, Peter addressed this issue. What had Christians done to pagans of Rome? There were some reasons, shallow as they may be.

1.The innate goodness of the believers annoyed individuals whose conscience were pricked by the Christian beliefs.

2.Roman disliked Christianity’s primary appeal to the working class.

3.The dogmatism of Christianity also rankled the sweeping pantheistic climate of Rome which held to hundred of deities, all of whom were idols of myths. Christians were monotheistic and worshipped one God.

4.Rome resented the Christians who were militantly evangelistic and took advantage of opportunities to proselytize people from all faiths.

5.Christians hold dogmatically to a belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, who spoke of a final judgment when all men would give account for their sins.

Take these five together and you’ve woven a fabric of hostility which still surrounds believers today who are in the world but are not of the world.

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