Daily Thoughts from Acts: Christianity and Persecution (Acts 8:1-3)

And Saul approved of his execution.

And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. Devout men buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison.  (Acts 8:1-3 ESV)

The Jews had been dispersed from Israel when conquered by Babylon 600 years earlier, then God allowed them to return having repented of their idolatry.  Now they were dispersing their own, fellow Jews who believed in Jesus as Messiah.  But this dispersion was going to help fulfill what Jesus had commanded the church to do, to be his witnesses in the rest of the world outside Jerusalem (Acts 1:8).  There was a good side to this persecution.

The death of Stephen seems to have set Saul on a course to ferret out all followers of Jesus and imprison them.  He is dogged and very successful at what he does, so that many are arrested.  Sometimes the greatest enemies of the church become her most profound believers.

The history of persecution is a long one for Christians:

“The persecution of Christians can be historically traced from the first century of the Christian era to the present day. Early Christians were persecuted for their faith at the hands of both Jews from whose religion Christianity arose and the Romans who controlled many of the lands across which early Christianity was spread. Early in the fourth century, a form of the religion was legalized by the Edict of Milan, and it eventually became the State church of the Roman Empire.

 

Christian missionaries as well as converts to Christianity have been the target of persecution ever since the emergence of Christianity, sometimes to the point of being martyred for their faith.

 

In the 20th century, Christians have been persecuted by various groups, including the Islamic Ottoman Empire in the form of the Armenian Genocide, the Assyrian Genocide and the Greek Genocide, as well as atheistic states such as the Soviet Union and North Korea. During World War II members of some Christian churches were persecuted in Nazi Germany for resisting Nazi ideology.

 

 

In more recent times, the Christian missionary organization Open Doors (UK) estimates that over 200 million Christians face persecution, particularly in Middle Eastern countries such as Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.”  [From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Christians]

It is estimated that 10,000 Christians die annually for their faith. [From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_martyrs]

But as church father Tertullian (200 AD) noted in his Apologeticus, chapter 50, “the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.”