There was a time when Christians were accused of being atheists…and it was an unintentional compliment.
Despite paying their taxes, submitting to governing authorities, and even offering prayers for the emperor and the empire as a part of their worship, the early church was accused, amongst other things, of being subversive atheists.
Justin Martyr, a convert from paganism who went on to become the most prominent amongst the early Church apologists, argued that Christians, while unwilling to worship the emperor or other gods or participate in social events associated with pagan religion, factually were moral, upright, and law-abiding citizens who were the empire’s “best allies in securing good order.”
John MacArthur provides essential cultural context to comprehend this accusation:
“The Romans had a very broad and somewhat tolerant attitude toward religion. They allowed their subjects to worship whatever gods they wanted to worship, as long as they also worshiped the Roman gods. Their approach to religion was all-inclusive and what bothered them about Christianity was Christianity was exclusive. Christians preached an exclusive message that there is only one true God, one Savior, and one way of salvation. And they not only believed that, but they propagated that. They preached that. They were evangelistic, trying to win converts among the nations that were part of the Roman world.
This went against the prevailing, dominant role of religious pluralism. Christians therefore were denounced, strangely, as atheists because they rejected the Roman pantheon of gods, because they would not worship the emperor as God, and because they didn’t worship idols. And the Romans couldn’t disassociate a god from an idol. If you had no idol, you had no god. They were atheists. And so, here are these subversive atheists, assaulting the unity and the peace of Rome with their exclusive God and exclusive message.”
My fellow believing Americans, does this sound painfully familiar?
It should.
We, too, in 2020 live in an “inclusive” society, angered by Christianity’s exclusive message. Refusal, like the early Christians, to acknowledge any god other than society’s pluralistic false deity, will produce wrath, amidst society’s redefined definition of tolerance.
Additionally, I think it’s essential to note Satan’s malicious practice of leveraging cultural contexts in redefining words, then and now.
Darrow Miller in A Toxic New Religion how this tactic is at work, once again, 2,000 years later,
“You would think that the new religion by now would have created its own particular vocabulary—but no. For the last 50 years or so, it has simply redefined some of our culture’s most important words. For example, Eric Metaxas and Anne Morse note sardonically that the new religion’s abortion activists ‘like to use the same words we pro-lifers use, but they’re using an entirely different dictionary.’ Which words have been redefined across culture? Only words such as marriage, freedom, love, compassion, and justice—words that are the very foundation stones of Western culture. According to Os Guinness, ‘There has been a subtle shift in the meaning of many Western ideas, so that once-strong Jewish and Christian [words] are now used in different ways that decisively change their meaning.’
This matters because words matter. They have the power to convey truth and help us understand reality—or obscure it. Words and language are the basic building blocks of culture. Stripping words of their true meaning turns out to be incredibly destructive.”
Ultimately, I believe:
- We, “Christian atheists,” should brace for a wave of intensified persecution.
- God’s grace is sufficient.
And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Cor. 12:9–10)
- Persecution, while painful, will ultimately purify the Church and glorify the Lord, as it purges false teachers, false gospels, and false professions of faith.
