This month, I shared my research and conclusions at the Litfin Symposium at Wheaton College’s Billy Graham Center.
The theme was “Contending for Gospel Mission in Christian Leadership,” and I was tasked with addressing the question, “Are American Christians persecuted?” I was also tasked with discussing leadership development in light of living in a culture that is increasingly dismissive of … and sometimes hostile toward … biblical Christianity.
These lectures weren’t recorded, so I’m presenting the talk in a five-part series here at Underground Rising. I hope you find it helpful for your Christian life, wherever you may serve.
PART 1 – "Are American Christians Persecuted?" Let’s Think it Through…
Thank you for inviting me to this forum. I am excited to share with you some of the ideas we wrestle with at the Edmiston Center at Reformed Theological Seminary in Atlanta.
At the Edmiston Center, we study and develop leaders around the practical theology of Christian endurance under anti-Christian hostility.
May Christ be magnified in our time together.
How should leaders and lay people alike respond to two opposing notions: One, that American Christians are, indeed, on the road to persecution, and two, that it is impossible for an American Christian to be considered “under persecution” with all our historical, cultural power, constitutional rights, and freedoms.
I have been tasked with framing a broader perspective to help us, leaders, better understand how to engage in a culture where Christianity is not the presumptive norm. To do this, I’d like to lay a foundation from the truthful narrative of Scripture and take us back to what we already know.
WHEN DID PERSECUTION OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD BEGIN?
The first act of hostility against the People of God didn’t begin in the Book of Acts; it began in the garden, with the People of God to whom He made His irrevocable Covenantal promise: I will be your God, and you will be my people.
God starts with His “Let there be’s.” All the “let there be’s” were set in an order that builds toward one end – the flourishing of the man and woman.
Whatever item was created was created for the sustenance of the thing that came after it, building … building. And after all of Let, there be’s are done… He moves into a different kind of agency.
Let us make.
God in Three Persons rolls up His sleeves, and he makes. The making is intimate. It is tactile. He is no longer creating with his words; he is fashioning with His own hand.
He fashions and breathes life into Adam, and then he fashions Woman. Everything is in place for Adam and Woman to flourish, and an implicit promise is made to this first little missional community in God’s peaceful Kingdom, summed up and repeated throughout Scripture in one grand covenantal sentence:
“I will be your God, and you will be my people.”
Adam and Woman represent not only the first marriage and not just the first family, they also represent the first missional community, worshiping the one true and Triune God in a sanctuary prepared for them. They are tasked with the spread of peace, safety, and the knowledge of their God … shalom.
Shortly after God promises that He will be their God and they will be his people, we see the first assault against the promised people. They are deceived by a false narrative that stands against the truthful one …by an enemy of their Creator. Like a snowball rolling down history’s mountain, gaining momentum and size, by the time we get to Revelation, that serpent is a full-blown dragon, no longer troubling the first two people of God but troubling all of God’s People.
So much so that when John the Revelator saw the Lamb open the fifth seal, he saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had borne. They cried out with a loud voice, “Lord Jesus, How Long must I suffer this way… ” Then they were each given a white robe and told to rest a little longer until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they themselves had been.
THE NEXT GENERATION
What does the next generation teach us about persecution?
Let’s look at Cain and Abel., where this pattern of abuse against the People of God wastes no time in escalating. One generation after our parents in the garden, the argument over who and how we will worship intensifies. This was no mere battle between siblings; this was a spiritual battle. In their struggle, we see the Way of Cain vs. the Way of Abel, the Worship of Self vs Worship of God. We also see a violent expression of hatred toward the people of God because they worship rightly, in obedience and thanksgiving. Both brothers bear the image of God, but only one preconfigures the life of Christ.
And so the beat of hostility toward the People of God continues through the line of history.
THE BIBLICAL LANGUAGE OF PERSECUTION
This language is reserved for a narrow identity category with a singular focus - the Body of Christ. The biblical language of persecution - the range of promised responses from insults to physical violence to death outlined in 1st and 3rd Peter and the book of Acts - is solely reserved for those suffering because they name the name of Christ.
A Biblical understanding of persecution resists being defined by ethnic groups, tribes, genders, causes, or any human division; it is defined by alignment and identity with the Body of Christ.
What happened in the garden was an all-out, tactical assault against the people of God.
Summary – Biblical persecution is the extension of the age-old battle between the first family in Christ and the serpent; between Cain and Abel; the Spirit of man-centered Religion versus the Spirit of True Worship.