Upside Down Living #7 - Endurance in a Time of Persecution
Message Description
Dr. Kurt Bjorklund looks at Matthew 5:10-12 about how the persecuted are blessed, what Christian persecution has looked like historically and today, and how we can face persecution with an attitude of joy.
Message Transcript
Welcome again to Orchard Hill. Welcome online and those of you in Butler County, the Strip District, Wexford. It's great to be together as part of Orchard Hill this weekend. We have been working our way through one of Jesus's most famous teachings, what's known as the Sermon on the Mount and we've been looking at especially at what are known as these Beatitudes, these blessed statements that Jesus gives. And today we come to one that really is upside down. We've called this whole series Upside Down Living because Jesus suggestions about how we live His commands if you want to use that term, his Maxim's are really upside down to how we go about thinking of life. And here, we have heard and read this statement, "Blessed are those who are persecuted." And that goes against everything that we tend to think. And so many times, we might even read these words or hear these words and think, well, this is a fairly thin slice of what the Bible says. And maybe Jesus was just speaking to a specific group of people at a specific time. And it isn't really a thing. So, let me just give you some other verses, other places in the Bible that talk about persecution so you can see how substantial this really is.
This is Luke chapter six, verse 22 and 23. "Blessed are you when people hate you, when they exclude you and insult you and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man. 'Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, because great is your reward in heaven. For that as how their ancestors treated the prophets.'" Then verse 26, "Woe to you when everyone speaks well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets." And then Jesus says this just a little later in verse 40, just in case, we're thinking that this again just applies to some people. He says, "The student is not above the teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like their teacher." In other words, not only will you be like the teacher in the content of your character, but some of your experiences will be the same.
Acts chapter five, verse 41, "The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name." Acts chapter eight, verses one through four, "On that day a great persecution broke out against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. Godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him. But Saul began to destroy the church. Going from house to house, he dragged off both men and women and put them in prison. Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went."
Second Timothy chapter three verse 12, "In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted..." First Peter chapter four verses 12 through 14, "Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you."
Second Corinthians chapter 12, verse 10, "That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."
Mark chapter 13, verse 11, "Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit."
Now, you may hear all of those verses and say, okay, so the Bible has a lot to say about persecution, I get it. So, let me just ask you this question. Does this square with your experience of Christianity? Maybe you're here and you've been a follower of Jesus for a long time. Is this how you've experienced your Christian faith? Or maybe you're here and you say, I'm not sure that I'm a follower of Jesus, or I'm new to this. Is this how you've perceived Christian faith? Now, my guess is that there are a variety of answers. Obviously, there's a yes and a no answer. But there are different reasons for yes and no. Some of us would say yes, because we've actually experienced some significant persecution in our lives or we've seen it, or we've read about it, and we say yes, this is how I see it. Some of us would say yes. And maybe our version of persecution is somewhat exaggerated because we want it to be true because we've read it and we think it should be true. And so, we imagine persecution where no persecution exists.
And then some of us would say, no. That hasn't been my experience persecution. It's not what I perceive. And we would say no, because we would say, I just haven't experienced it. And then we would maybe ask the question, well, maybe the reason I haven't experienced it is because I haven't been bold enough in my faith, or anyone who isn't persecuted hasn't been bold enough in their faith. Maybe you've heard people say that kind of thing about these verses. Or maybe you would say no, and just say, you know, I've lived in a fortunate time, a fortunate place, where this just hasn't been my experience in life.
And so the question that really leads us to is how do we reconcile these verses that seemed to be consistent throughout the New Testament that are saying if you are a follower of Jesus expect persecution and probably the predominant state of the American church, the American Christian that is not filled with stories of persecution? How do we reconcile these things?
Well, first, I just like to say this, and that is Christians have been historically and are currently being persecuted around the world and have been historically persecuted around the world more than Christians have lived without persecution. In other words, the experience historically and even globally, is much more bent toward persecution than it isn't. Living in America and the time in which we live and not being persecuted for our faith is the exception, not the rule when it comes to Christian experience.
Just a couple examples of this; In China, a generation plus ago, there was a man named Watchman Nee who lived and he became famous because of some of his writings. He lived during the time of Chairman Mao and what happened was, he was writing, and it was being read widely and people were converting to Christianity because of it. And when the communist government wanted to restrict Christianity, the ideals of the communist regime said, we can't allow this group to have any sway. And so, they imprisoned him and imprisoned and tortured Christians all over, and his writings continued to get out. And what would happen was that they would put new guards on him every day, literally, they would never have the same guard so he couldn't sneak anything out. And they would be put on him in six-hour shifts. And he'd have six hours basically, to convince the guard of the worthiness of the Christian message and to take his writings and to distribute them so that the church in China could get it. I mean, this is the kind of stuff that has happened not thousands of years ago, but hundreds of years ago in our world, and is still happening.
In fact, there's a Christianity Today article at the beginning of this year that cited some statistics. And here are just a few. They say last year in our world, that there were eight Christians killed every day because of their faith. That there were 182 churches a week in this world that are attacked or destroyed by people who are hostile to the faith. That there are some 260 million Christians worldwide who suffer persecution on a significant level. And in Asia, the numbers two out of five Christians suffer significant persecution. Now, the reason I just start here is because sometimes our perception of our world is so centered on exactly where and when we live, that we can't appreciate the broader scope of the world. And the fact that the Bible when it speaks to Christian suffering and persecution is speaking very pointedly to something that has been happening and is happening all around the world, even if it's not your or my personal experience.
Now, having said that, I think it's also important to say that the American church may well be headed to persecution. Now, there are certainly those who would look today and say, oh, the church is already being persecuted. Look at the assault on religious liberty, and that is real. Look at how some people will say if you want to hold a biblical position on certain issues, there are people who want to categorize it as hate speech, and that is real. And so, some people would look and say, oh, that's the persecution. But in a way, what that really is, is it's the Christian culture or the church losing maybe its status as a preferred way of thinking in our country to not being preferred.
Now, I'm not saying that there isn't persecution. In fact, what I'm saying is the American church may well be headed to persecution. And the reason that I say this is one, just the flow of history, the flow of Christians throughout all of history, would suggest that at some point, the favored status that Christians have had in some ways in this country may not last in perpetuity.
But I also say this because of two facts that are future looking in the Bible. One is when you read the book of Revelation, and there's certainly a debate among scholars on how you should read the book of Revelation, is it all future, is it cyclical, is it topology, but however you read the book of Revelation, it talks about this that appears to be future and in which being a Christian is incredibly difficult.
And here's the other thing that's striking about any Bible prophecy, that's yet to come, and that is there's little or no mention or no discernible mention of any Western power. In other words, you read about Israel, you read about armies from the east, and nations from the north, and conglomerates, but there's never a Western power. And the reason this has always fascinated me is because what this means is that as our world is currently constituted, America has to on some level, become a non-player in world events in order for the biblical vision of how things come together in culmination of battles to play out. The reason that this is significant is it means we've either become as a nation completely isolationist, or completely irrelevant on the world scene. Either neutered because we have no might or power left or no will to engage in the political issues of our world.
Now, you may say what does that have to do with the American church that may be purely political and it may be, but what that probably is pointing to is a country that no longer is either capable or willing to engage in the issues of right and wrong in our grander world. And then here's the other thing and this is Mark chapter 13. I read one of these verses at the beginning but just hear some of these verses where Jesus is speaking very pointedly about what is happening or in going to happen. This Mark chapter 13, verse nine and following, it says, "“You must be on your guard. You will be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogues. On account of me you will stand before governors and kings as witnesses to them. 10 And the gospel must first be preached to all nations. 11 Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit. 12 “Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child. Children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. 13 Everyone will hate you because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved."
Now, again, there are those who debate and say this was fulfilled in AD 70, and some things like that, but it sure seems to me like Jesus still has some future part of this when he points ahead and he says, listen, there's coming a day when you will be handed over. Don't worry about what you say, but kids and families will be turned against each other. in other words, the Bible is consistent in this idea of saying, saying there is persecution. Now, you may say okay, this is not an encouraging story that you're telling today. It's got to get darker before it gets better. Persecution may not just be in the American churches future it may be in your future if you're a follower of Jesus. In fact, I would say the only way that persecution can ultimately be avoided is the grace of time where God just simply extends the time in which American Christians live without persecution. And we may have a part in how that plays out as people of faith, if you are a person of faith, or that we go to the effort of compromise, where we say we want to so get along that we don't stand out and we're not persecuted.
I mentioned the issue of hate speech becoming something that people are using to say even if you just teach some things, the Bible says you'll be accused of that. Certainly, the tax-exempt status of religious institutions in our country is under attack. We could talk about higher education and how so much of the agenda and curriculum is geared to dismantle some of the ideas and beliefs of Christianity. And the reason I say you may well be part of this is, you can't simply read this and just say this is all out there. It's a little bit like being on a roller coaster, you know, the last time you're on a roller coaster, but you remember when you're going up and it's kind of pulling you up and you're just sitting there waiting for the drop. It's kind of like that. We're on that upward tick waiting for the drop of that roller coaster. And my point isn't to try to be dramatic about that, as much as it is to simply say that this is something Jesus talks about. And not only this, but he says, this is when you will be blessed.
Now, let's look at Matthew five again. It says, "Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." And then he expands at verse 11, "'Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. '"Now, notice how this fits into being persecuted. How he defines it, insults. Pretty simple concept. Pretty simple word. He says, you will have people who will tear you down. And insults can be there to your face or behind your back. In other words, if you are a genuine follower of Jesus, there will be times when people will say all kinds of things about you, that simply are to tear you down.
Now, again, you can see this in the broader culture. But you can even experience this in work and in school and in your dorm and in different settings where people will say things just to run you down. I still can recall from when I was in high school, and yes, I can still remember that. But I can still recall being with a group of guys and some of the things that were said, because I didn't want to do or be exactly like all the other guys. And my point isn't I was good. My point is, if you say I'm going to choose to follow Jesus Christ, there are people who will say, I don't like it and I'm going to insult you. And then he says persecution. And the idea of persecution is simply to be treated poorly, not because of anything you've done. So, it could be all kinds of things. And then there's this idea of being lied about or spoken falsely about. And this is where people will often impugn your motives. They'll say things and assume things that simply aren't true. And they'll say, and because of what you stand for, I'm going to assume all of these things. And that is how Jesus says, His people, His followers, will be treated.
Now, I just want to clarify a couple things. And that is, I don't think it's persecution when somebody ignores you, even a Christian person ignores you, because you've been obtuse, judgmental, or difficult. Sometimes people will confuse persecution with people just simply saying, I don't want to deal with you because you're judgmental or difficult or a pain. It's not persecution when you choose to do something that is right, and because of it, you don't get an opportunity. That's not persecution. That's just simply existing in our world. But genuine Christianity will largely put you at odds with our culture. And that means that there are times that you'll stand apart from it. And sometimes it will be church people and Christians who will be some of the most difficult people because if you have a version of God that they don't like, they don't care for, then they might be the very ones who insult you, persecute you, treats you poorly for no reason, or say things that aren't simply true.
There's a little poem that was written years ago, and it's been credited to a number of people. And so, I won't try to give it credit to anybody but here's how it goes. You may recognize this that people are often unreasonable and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. If you are kind people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you are honest, people may cheat you. Be honest anyway. If you find happiness, people may be jealous. Be happy anyway. If you do good today, it may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough, but give the world your best anyway. For you see, in the end, it's between you and God. It has never been between you and them anyway. And what that's simply doing is saying that you have something that you can say is bigger than kind of this persecution.
So, now, what does Jesus do? He says blessed. Okay, we've talked about that concept over the last several weeks, meaning your life will feel fulfilled. But then he says, rejoice and be glad. Jesus' exhortation is what's going to happen. Then he says, here's what I want you to do. I want you to rejoice and be glad when this happens in your life. Now, the Greek word for "be glad" is especially significant here. It might not be significant but insightful. And the reason I say that is because the word actually has the idea of jump for joy and do a little dance. All right now, I'm not going to do a little dance for you, but I'm going jump. I mean, that's what the idea is. In other words, when you go through persecution, it should almost cause you to be so excited that you're like, yes. Now, that is upside down. In fact, I would suggest that what we do today, especially if you're a person of faith, is we live with some different reactions. One is we hear this teaching about persecution, and we're afraid. And we go, oh no, it's bad stuff that's coming. But you know what Jesus does, he doesn't say be afraid, bad things are coming. He says you if you're counted worthy, basically, to suffer in my name, rejoice. It's an evidence that you are my child, and it's an opportunity for witness. It's not some strange thing. This is what Christians have been doing forever. This is a good thing. You don't need to be afraid.
But not only that, sometimes it isn't being afraid. Sometimes what will happen is instead of fear, we'll say, you know what, what I need to do is I need to figure out how to get along with the dominant culture so that I'm never at odds with it. And this is where we talk about compromise and conformity. And a lot of times, this isn't a conscious decision where we say, oh, I'm going to do this. But what we do is whenever we walk into a situation where there's any potential of disagreement, or having some kind of a disparaging relationship because of the views that you have, is you might say, you know what, I'm going to keep them to myself. I'm not going to talk about them. I'm going to say things in such a way that I'm not at odds with the dominant culture.
I saw a little article this last week that I thought was good. And it helped me think about our church and politics, especially as we enter into this political season. I guess we're already well into it. But we're never really out of a political season. But the article said, in essence, a church can take one of four postures on politics. Said one as it can try to never say anything about anything that anybody perceives as being political so that it stays above the fray. And the article said, but if you do that, you'll never actually speak to any real issues. Because real issues do have some political implications.
Then it said, you can take a position that's entirely left so that you offend anybody on the right and everyone who's on the left goes, yeah, this is the greatest church and it supports basically an ideology. You can take a position that's on the right, which is we take this position and now everyone on the left is offended, but everyone on the right goes, this is great. We're all together in this.
And then the author of this article said or you can take a biblical position, which means at times you're going offend people on the right and on the left, because the Bible and Christianity can't be contained in either party. And then I love the one line that this article had. The author said at some point you will be offended by the Bible. And you should almost be open to that and excited to be offended by the Bible because the Bible can't be contained in our simple ideologies. And what some of us will do is instead is we'll change the ideology of the Bible to fit either our political views or our personal views in such a way that we're never offended by the Jesus that we encounter. And we never get outside of a category. And therefore, we're always hunkering down on one side or the other.
Now, I'm not suggesting that you don't take a political affiliation personally or that you don't drive down hard into politics. In fact, I want to encourage you to vote to let your voice be heard at the polls, but that's not my point. My point is that sometimes you can't help but offend when you take the Bible seriously. And that's true.
Sometimes what we'll do is instead of fear or conformity is we will let the idea of persecution lead us to agitation or resentment or fighting. And I'm not suggesting here again that there aren't some battles that we should be in. But there's a difference between agitation and resentment and saying, I'm going to stand for something. And what some people of faith do is they simply get so agitated with everything that they dislike what's happening in culture. Everything they perceive as a slight is that they feel like they're on a battle cry constantly.
Now, again, I'm not suggesting that there aren't times to say this is a battle to engage in, or this is something that culturally needs to be addressed. What I'm saying is this and that is Jesus' instruction is not be agitated, irritated, and fight everybody tooth and nail on everything but rejoice and be glad. Do a little jump. Do one of these when you say, wow, look at what Jesus has allowed us to encounter. That's what he says, read the text. Some of us will say, well, I just want to withdraw. I don't want to deal with any of it. I don't want any debate. I don't want any problems with anybody. This isn't even about politics. This is just simply, you know, Jesus is the only way to go. I don't have an opinion. I don't want to talk about anything. And what that is, again, is saying, I don't want to deal with any persecution.
Jesus says, you're blessed if you're persecuted. Rejoice and be glad. How do you do this? How do I do this? Why would you want to do this? If you're listening today and you're saying, listen, I'm not sure that I'm a follower of Jesus or I'm not sure why I would sign up for what you're talking about. Why would I want this? Why would you want this? Why would we do anything that would bring this on? Well, let me say that Jesus' words here, rejoice, be glad, is because there's something greater. There's something greater that you're getting when you go through this persecution. And ultimately, Jesus went to the cross. That symbol of Christianity oftentimes is the cross. It's the empty tomb. It's that Jesus went to the grave to pay for our sins. And whatever persecution we go for, we have something so much greater. And so, going through some kind of persecution isn't odd. It shows that God values people as his children and that they live in the real reality of what God has done.
So, let me just put it like this. Imagine that you're going to take a group of grade schoolers on an all-day boat tour on Lake Erie. And you're going to go way out from shore. When you go out, you have a handful of floaties to distribute to the kids. You don't think you'll need the floaties. You're on a boat. But you give a few kids floaties and you say these are for you. If anything happens, keep this floatie. Now, how do you think some of the kids would treat the kids who have the floaties? Some of the kids would be like why do you have a floaty? You're crazy. This boat's not going sink. Can't you swim? You scared? What's wrong with you scaredy pants? I mean, you could hear all those things. The kid who has the floaty has been told, keep the floaty. Good things come to those with floaties. Okay.
Now maybe, there's different ways you can play this out. You can talk about the ships sinking and needing the floaty, but maybe the kids with the floaties get the fast-cool tow behind the boat on the water thing that's going happen. I mean you could talk about all kinds of ways that this could play out. But here's my point to this. When you say I am trusting Jesus Christ as my Savior, what you're doing is you're saying, I am living in a temporary place and time, and there's something better ahead for me and I'm clinging to it no matter what happens all the way around me.
And the reason that you would sign up for this is because this life is short. This life isn't everything. This life will not define you ultimately. The choices you make in this life will, but this life will not. And what that means is what people think about you. What you endure, the insults, the lies, and any of that stuff, is secondary to saying if I've trusted Jesus Christ with my life, then I know I have heaven waiting. And if I'm faithful to Jesus in the here and now, then not only do I have heaven waiting, but there's a reward that God has promised for those who've trusted Him. And what that means is you can take whatever persecution, whatever difficulty, whatever hardship comes your way, with a sense of saying, okay God, I know I wasn't just created for this earth. I'm on a day trip on a boat, and I've been given a floaty because there's something better that's coming in the days ahead.
Now, some of us are in places where maybe, we wouldn't call it technical persecution, but maybe we're married to somebody who's just difficult when it comes to the moral choices that we try to make. The things that we try to do to reflect Jesus, and they're just at us all the time. Maybe we have parents who stand against any pursuit of anything spiritual. Or if we have any sense of saying I think God might be working in my life this way, there are people who are like, no, no, no, you need to do this or you need to do that. Maybe we have a group of friends who every time we decide to do something mock us and wherever we sit in those things. The point of Jesus is to say, know that if you're insulted or treated poorly without cause, if people speak falsely about you, this is a reason to rejoice because it means that you have a floatie for the future, even where you are today.
Just to be honest, probably if we weren't working through this verse by verse, I would not talk about persecution. It's not a topic I'm drawn to. But the text had this here. And the reason I say that is because this isn't something that I'm like ooh, persecution, let's talk about all the ways the world's out to get Christians today. That's not how I'm naturally wired. But when I read through and studied this text in preparing for this, I was just struck by Jesus simplicity and directness to say, rejoice and be glad every time you endure something that is unfair or unjust because of me, because that's when you're going to have the biggest blessing. I hope I can do that. I hope you can do that. And I hope if you're a person who says I'm not sure if I'm even a person of faith, that even today you're starting to say, you know what, there might be something greater to trusting who God is and what God has for my future than simply what I can get out of this life.
Father, we thank you for a chance just to gather online, in-person, and at all of our campuses. And God I just pray very simply today that every one of us who's listening right now would know that there is something greater than this life. That is what You promise. And that the pathway to that isn't just merely through persecution. It's through your Son who took the ultimate persecution for us. And whatever persecution we take, is just a taste reminding us of what Jesus has done on our behalf and pointing us to the beauty and the reality of what's ahead. We pray this in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
