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IS THEWORLD BECOMING
CHRISTIAN?
Take the United States, for example. More Americans attend church in an average week than attend
al/ professional basebal/, basketball, and football games combined in the average year. Al/ athletic
events ofall kinds draw less than 1115th as many people in a week as attend church. How did it come
M
ost people alive today are
accustomed to a world full
of professing Christians, a
world in which Christian thought
and Christian values have had or
are having a major influence on the
civilization of planet Earth, a world
scarcely a comer of which has not
heard to sorne degree or another of
Christ and a religion whicb goes by
His name.
Today messengers and mis–
sionaries march or have marched
through jungles and swamps,
through forests and plains, over
continents and islands, in the Arctic,
South America, darkest Africa,
Southeast Asia, the islands of the
Pacific, the glacier-studded moun–
tains ofequatorial New Guinea.
But it hasn't always been that
way. Less than nineteen hundred
and sixty years ago, not one single
Christian walked the earth.
Then- suddenly- something new
was introduced to the world. A pre–
existing Divine Being was born as a
man, as Jesus of Nazareth. He
taught, suffered, died, was buried
and resurrected. He retumed to
heaven- and sent back tbe Holy
Spirit of God to earth to dwell in
and empower His handful of weak
and bewildered disciples!
That was to be the beginning of
His Church .
•
To What Purpose?
He had charged His disciples- af–
ter His brief postresurrection
sojourn of 40 days with them (dur–
ing which He bad Jed them away
from Jerusalem as far as Galilee
and back again)-that they were not
to leave Jerusalem until they were
12
to be that way?
by
Lawson C. Briggs
baptized with the Holy Spirit (Acts
1:4-5).
He had founded the Church He
had promised (Matt. 16: 18); founded
it to grow, to multiply and spread
abroad over the face of the earth, to
bear witness to His resurrection and
proclaim an advance message of His
second coming and full-scale inter–
ven tion in human affai rs.
HisChurch was tostart thesmallest
possible- and il did! Like a grain of
mustard seed, which is one of the
smallest of all seeds but grows into
oneofthe largest ofplants. (See Mark
4:30-32, Matthew 13 :3 1-32 and Luke
13:
18-19.)
But then, Christ promised,
He would return and turn His Church
into His Kingdom- a world-ruling
Kingdom ofGod.
To this end, His first disciples
were to go into all the world with
the gospel (Acts 1:8) and to make
many into His disciples (Matt.
28: 19-20). AU these disciples were
afterward called "Christians" (Acts
11 :26).
How Has lt Happened?
Christianity broughl tremendous
hope lo the downtrodden masses,
lhe discouraged, the disiUusioned,
the depressed and oppressed.
It
promised not only a resurrection
from the dead- as Chrisl has been
raised, so can we all- but also a uto–
pian world in which to Iive after
Christ's return. For three centuries,
in spite of all persecution, this gos–
pel increased its adherents in the
Roman Empire as well as in the
East under Parthian rule.
In the fourth century a great
breakthrough occurred with the
abrupt switch from imperial Roman
persecution of Christianity to its
high official favor, even an estab–
lished status, under the first "Chris–
tian" emperor, Constantine. From
then on, multitudes rapidly em–
braced the faith , not only in the Ero–
pire but in the nations and tribes of
Europe adjoining and influenced by
the Empire. But with Christianity's
universal success carne corruption of
its doctrines and morals, and a
de-emphasis of the very factors of
hope which had been its greatest
strengths.
Shortly, as the fourth century be–
carne the fifth , the Roman Empire
crumbled politicaUy and mi)jtarily
in
the West, only to be replaced by
• the Byzantine Empire in the East
and later by the Holy Roman Ero–
pi re in the West. Beyond Pa lestine,
not much later, Christianity began
to be swept back by the Muslims in
allthe lands lo the east and south of
the Mediterranean, until eventually
only moribund liturgies like the
Coptic, the Ethiopic, the Nostorian
(or Assyrian), and the Armenian–
all perhaps more pagan than Chris–
tian- remained where once the
Church had been strong.
Meanwhile, in Europe, Christian–
ity was propagated to the north and
northeast by those employing the
sword and coercion, perhaps uncon–
sciously copying the unchristian
method of conversion used by the
followers of Muhammad: "Embrace
Islam, or die." Discounting for the
moment the quality of its "con–
versions," we may note that sorne
slight territorial extension of Chris–
tianity was thus made. But Chris–
tianity was, and remained until
modero times, essentially a Euro-
The
PLAIN TRUTH September 1978