One of the things that amaze me about Jesus is some of the claims that He made while on Earth, trying to spread the Kingdom of God. Usually if someone is trying to get people to follow their idea, they promise them some sort of reward. For example, if one lived during the time before the American Revolution, it would be expected that the American rebels would promise their followers great things, such as the chance to be free from tyranny, freedom from taxes, and so on. They would want to promise something that would appeal to human nature.
Most religions you see this same type of line. “Do this, and you are going to get a great reward in the afterlife” and the reward is usually something which our mortal minds and flesh desire. Maybe it’s the complete release one gets from Buddhism. Or perhaps it’s the reward of eternal orgies, rivers of alcohol, treasure, or simply the notion of having our every desire to be dished out to us. Even in this life, there are plenty of religions that promise good things to their followers now. Example of this is the “prosperity gospel” which plagues American churches. They tell their follower things like “If you make a faith covenant with God by sending me $1000, then God will give you 10 times what you gave!” Even many modern evangelical preachers, who are preaching the real Gospel fall into the trap of promising things for followers “Accept Jesus into your heart, and everything will be better”. Sure, it all sounds great. I’d love it if it were true. But Jesus said very different things to His followers
“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.Remember the word that I said 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.
What?!?
That is what you promise us Jesus?
Who does that? I mean, Jesus would do terrible at sales and PR in today’s world. But you know what? It is the truth. Christians all over the world suffer, just as Jesus suffered. Here in America, we have it pretty good though. We don’t have to worry about persecution. I think the extent of the persecution that most of us might see would be in the form of ridicule. The worst I ever had was someone spitting on me and cursing me. Sure, there are stories about individuals who are killed for sharing their faith here and there. For instance, there were two brothers shot in Boynton Beach, Florida earlier in the year for sharing their faith to troubled youth. And there was the rash of fires that happened in Christian churches in the south. Yet these tend to be isolated incidents, thankfully. In fact, I think we have it so easy that some Christians really believe that someone saying “Happy Holidays” to them is a sign of persecution.My point is that here we don’t really have an idea of what it means to be persecuted.
That bothers me deeply.
Not because I have some sort of sick and twisted desire to see people suffer. It’s quite the opposite of that. If I had it my way, none of my brothers or sisters would have to suffer. That is not up to me though. The reason I am deeply bothered is that in our American churches, our persecuted family seems to get forgotten. However, we have the time and desire to argue over curtains, carpets, music styles, dress codes, translations of the Bible to use and so on. We have committees to discuss trivial issues. We create ministries to fit every obscure niche (Somewhere out there, I know there is a minister of serving latte to the congregation. I just know it!). Despite all of the unnecessary things filling up our priority list, we seem to lose sight of the real priorities. There are many priorities that we miss, which I won’t discuss them all now, but among the top of the list of these missed priorities is forgetting the persecuted church. Have we forgotten 1 Corinthians 12:26? If one member suffers, then we all suffer with them! Have we forgotten the example of the Church in acts? They were selling all they had, to make sure their brothers had their needs met.
I wish we knew persecution more, that we may identify with our brothers and do whatever we could to help them persist during their suffering by suffering along side with them.But I realize that our culture has taken over our minds. I realize that we’d rather spend money on temporary luxuries, than to feed our brother. I know we’d rather spend money on that weekend trip to have fun, rather than taking that time to go into the slums and giving hope to our family, and not just our family, but to all people.
You see, our brothers and sisters they accept Christ, wherever they may be, knowing that people will hate them. The church in Sudan knows that they could end up like the Christians who have been crucified there. The church in China knows that when they meet to discuss the wonders and joy of Christ, they could be, at any moment, arrested by communist soldiers. The underground church in Saudi Arabia knows that if they were to openly confess converting from Islam to Jesus, they would be executed for being apostates, per Saudi law.
But you know what?
They, like the early church, have no qualms with being persecuted, even to the death. Their joy is not in this life. Their prize is not some temporary pleasure that religion offers. They don’t look forward to endless personal desires being fulfilled in paradise.No, their prize, their crown, the very treasure is Jesus Christ. I think of the book of Revelation, where the saints in heaven cast their crowns before Christ! Why? Jesus is their treasure. There is no other name under Heaven which saves, and they count it all joy to be persecuted for His name and His sake.
I desperately hope for that type of faith to sweep over our churches. I pray for the faith to throw away everything that isn’t Christ. I pray to rejoice in the suffering with them. I pray that we can identify with our hurt and suffering brethren, that we may join with them in the Glory of Jesus. I pray that we could ease their pain; help bear their burdens.
Remember that Jesus is our treasure, the number one priority of our lives. Remember that he is eternally worthy. Remember that He made us, His Church, to be His beautiful bride. This doesn't just mean His church in America, who has extreme riches and resources, but the church world wide. Remember that He bought us all with His blood, and unified us in His Kingdom. There is NO reason, if we treasure Jesus and His Bride, for us to forget or even ignore the Saints around the world.
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