Persecution is Coming

By Stephen Feinstein

Persecution. This is a subject that most Christians do not want to think about. Yet, most of us that read our Bibles know that we are promised trials and tribulations. Jesus was pretty clear on this topic:

"If the world hates you, understand that it hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own. However, because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of it, the world hates you. Remember the word I spoke to you: A servant is not greater than his master. If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours." John 15:18-20.

Paul the Apostles also speaks of the inevitability of persecution. He says in 2 Timothy 3:12, "In fact, all who want to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted." So clearly, the Bible tells us to expect it, but sometimes it is hard to see how it might be coming. Truly, a storm is gathering. To help us see this, I will offer a brief lesson from church history, and then compare it to what we are presently seeing.

In the early church, persecution was something that you could see coming. It had a certain soil. The soil of persecution is what made it not only possible, but inevitable. What was the soil? Well, the surrounding culture despised both Christianity and Christians. Christians would not jump on board with Roman holidays, its public entertainment, its sexual ethic, its divorce culture, its abortion and infanticide culture, its education system, and its overall worldview. Christian disagreement with and abstaining from the norms of the culture made them an easy group to despise. People don't attack those they like. But when natural disasters occurred, the potential scapegoat must be a group already hated. Christianity was a universal religion, meaning it sought after the salvation of all people, which was a call to those people to reject their syncretism and worship the God of Israel exclusively through Jesus, the exclusive Savior. Christians would not kiss the ring of state power by declaring Caesar as lord. They would not celebrate the things the culture celebrated. They kept their kids out of the education system which sought to instill fealty to the Pagan gods. They boycotted the sexually explicit entertainment. They weren't often loud about it. But their mere abstaining spoke volumes. It was a judgment against the surrounding society. Therefore, the society hated them. Even as the society hated them, however, multitudes did convert to Christianity, which made the rest of society even angrier. It was because this soil was already present that legal persecutions could easily happen when an Emperor or governor deemed it favorable. In AD 247, Christians abstained from celebrating the 1,000 year anniversary of the founding of Rome. That angered the average Roman. Christians enjoyed a long reprieve from persecution prior to this, but after AD 247, Origen commented that anti-Christian attitudes were spreading everywhere. The soil was there, but the church was comfortable, thinking it wouldn't happen. Then came Emperor Decius' persecution in AD 250, and it caught them off guard, carrying with it long-lasting consequences.

I say all of this because it is obvious in our own time that the soil is there. Evangelicalism is hated because it opposes abortion, the LGBTQ revolution, the idolatrous obsession with unbridled autonomy, and sexually explicit entertainment. Evangelicals also are pulling their kids out of public education since it is now nothing more than re-education camps. Just as the ancient pagans blamed all disasters on the Christians, our current society declares biblical doctrine to be bigoted, regressive, and harm-inducing. Even though secularism has a carte blanche, discontentment, mental illnesses, and suicide rates increase. Yet, many have the audacity to blame Christianity for this rather than perceiving that increased disharmony is a natural consequence of rejecting God's Word.

People often try to blame the cultural animosity against Christianity on hypocrites and the Church's failure to handle sexual abuse. Both of these are tragic, and I am glad many churches are trying to do much better. But even if our hypocrites disappeared and we handled abuse perfectly, the soil is still there because ultimately, our rejection of the current zeitgeist renders us just as despicable in our culture's eyes as our ancient forebearers. The only reason persecution hasn't happened in a full-scale way is because of legal obstacles to it. But a time is coming. The soil is there. Those who dismiss this as alarmist are fools. They will be caught off guard as our brothers were in AD 250. For those of us with the wisdom to pay attention, our forebearers did leave us a good strategy for dealing with it both before and after. We need to boost up our apologetics. Christopher Watkins Biblical Critical Theory is a must read because it paves an excellent Augustinian way forward in dealing with the culture. In addition to our apologetics, we need to love each other like John 13:34-35 commands. We need to major on the majors and not fight and slander each other over the minors. If you can't tell the difference between the two, then get off social media, please! We need to do better on the social issues we've been weak on, but it needs to be biblically defined. I pray that evangelicals will heed what I am saying.

In summation, here is my point. Evangelicalism will be persecuted. It's only a matter of time. We already see small examples (lawsuits, employment termination, etc.). The soil is there. Our response should not be timidity and fear. Instead, we must become bolder in our proclamation and defense of the gospel. We must be more consistent in living out the Christian ethic. And we must resist the temptation to deny the obvious truth that a storm is indeed gathering.