Love of the church during this time of trials, tribulation
THE beginning of the book of Acts describes a beautiful picture. The early church lived in a time of Roman dominance. Since the Caesars of Rome felt that they were gods, they didn’t take kindly to anyone or anything that could possibly threaten that status.
Christians claimed to worship another God, an unseen God which gave them strength from within. History books tell us that in order to put a stop to people worshipping any being other than the Roman Caesar, tremendous persecution was applied.
This ranged from the very least being that the Christians lost their jobs and everyone was told that if they were found to be helping them, they would also lose their jobs. The hope was social isolation, inability to work, and hunger would drive them to denounce their faith in Christ and return their loyalty to the emperor.
When this didn’t work, more severe punishments such as throwing them to the lions in the arena, having their limbs torn apart, or be crucified were among other punishments common at the time meant to deter anyone who was even considering becoming a Christian to run the other way.
To the dismay of the Roman emperor, these horrific acts didn’t seem to deter the growth of Christianity at all. In fact, if anything it grew more during these troubling times. There are many historical and theological reasons for this; I don’t have time to go into all of those. One of the reasons I want to focus on today is the love of the church during this time of trials and tribulation. Acts 4:32-36 gives us a peek into what the early church looked like.
It describes a scene of everyone helping one another. Greed was put aside and love replaced it. The early Christians saw themselves as a big family. At times one would be blessed with material possessions and at times another. They shared freely so that never was there a time when anyone was in need. The Bible tells us that as the world watched this love where they took care of one another, watched as they fellowshipped and carried each other’s burdens, and watched as they felt joy even when their lives were being tortured — they flocked to the church in large numbers wanting to know their secret to love and joy in a world which was otherwise filled with such selfishness and greed. Today, we don’t find ourselves against a backdrop of persecution, but we certainly find ourselves against a backdrop of hard times. As in the early days, the temptation is to hoard and shut our doors, not knowing if our turn is next so we better be prepared.