early Christians – Lee Duigon

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St. Paul wrote the Epistle to the Philippians from Rome, where he was awaiting trial for assorted thought crimes against the state (some things never change). In closing his letter, he said,\

All the saints salute you, chiefly they that are of Caesar’s household. (Philippians 4:22)

Caesar’s household! Christians–right there in the very heart of the Roman Empire. Right there in Caesar’s house! And this less than 40 years after Jesus Christ was crucified–by Rome.

The Romans should have known that they were licked right there. Nevertheless, they went on to kill and jail as many Christians as they could lay their hands on. All those early Christians had to do, to save themselves from painful and humiliating deaths, was to deny Jesus Christ.

They didn’t.

And Christ did not and will not deny them.

While the German government is pulling out all the stops to do away with Germany as a coherent nation, the pastor of Zion Church in Berlin recently held a Star Wars-themed religious service, complete with very silly people wearing Darth Vader masks and carrying toy light sabers ( https://www.yahoo.com/tv/german-church-celebrates-star-wars-sunday-122152630.html ), the Associated Press reported recently.

This is taking “seeker-friendly” to new depths.

Pastor Lucas Ludewig said the Star Wars service was a big success and pulled a lot of people into the church. Pay heed to his words:

“It’s great that there are subjects that people are interested in. They trust us to make them part of the church service without making it too Christian or too Star Wars, but to find a good compromise.”

Gee, if only the early Christians had thought of this. They could have installed statues of the Roman emperor in their churches, and as part of the Christian worship service, burned incense to the emperor’s image and hailed him as a god. Wouldn’t that have been “a good compromise”?

Y’know what? I don’t think everybody understands that Star Wars is just a movie. Something that somebody made up.

And I’m pretty sure more and more pastors don’t understand what a church is for.