Valuing Christianity

Gather together…you fugitives from the nations. Ignorant are those…who pray to gods that cannot save (Isaiah 45:20).

At an international gathering in New York, a young American struck up a conversation with a cultured young woman from Burma. When he asked about the religion of her country, she told him that most of her people were Buddhists. The young American casually said, "Oh, well, I don’t suppose that matters much. All religions are about the same anyway." The Burmese woman stared him in the eye and replied, "If you had lived in my country, you would not say that. I have seen what centuries of superstition, fear and indifference to social problems have done to my people. We need the truth of Christianity. When I became a Christian, it cost me something. I suffered loss of friends, income, and social standing. If your religion had cost you more, it might mean more to you, too. My country needs Christ."

Germany was the home of the Protestant Reformation; today its churches stand mostly vacant. England produced the much-beloved King James Version of the Bible; today scarcely 8% of the population attend worship to hear God’s Word. At the turn of the last century, America led the world in sending out missionaries; today, Christian churches around the world have identified America as a mission field. What has happened?

The church has always thrived when it is hard to worship. Communist nations like The USSR and China tried to stamp out Christianity, and the church has grown stronger in those countries. It has been a huge challenge to translate the Bible into the many languages of the African continent and get the Good Book into isolated villages, but Christianity is a vibrant, growing faith in that part of the world.

But in Europe and America, things are different. Free and easy access to Bibles and churches seems to have resulted in people taking these blessings from God for granted. I have seen Bibles gathering dust in used bookstores. The thought that God’s word could be so casually treated would shock Christians living overseas! In many countries between the Mediterranean Sea and the Pacific Ocean, Christians risk arrest and beatings by going to church, while in our country people feel as if they are making a sacrifice by attending worship once a month!

God does not take us for granted—He offered up the life of His only Son to save us from living in misery and dying in eternity. Let us not take that sacrifice for granted.