At the beginning of November, a group of 15 youth leaders went to Rome, Italy. We divided our time between inspiring sightseeing and preparing of a strategy for the department of youth in Poland for 2020. I love going to places that I have read about in the Bible.
I’ve been to the Holy Land 19 times and didn’t expect a great experience in Rome. Who can know where the first church was gathering, the prison of the apostles or their graves were? Almost everything is tradition and manufactured for naive pilgrims like me. I traveled to Rome with similar thoughts, also sensing a mixture of prejudice and sadness in the face of how Christianity mixed up with an earlier pagan era.
Pagan Rome
Pagan temples were turned into churches, and even antique sculptures were renamed Christian saints. Another dimension unknown to original Christianity is wealth. Peter once said: “I do not have silver and gold ...” (Acts 3: 6). He learned to live in modesty from Jesus Christ.
Medieval leaders of the Christian church, although they referred to the succession of Apostle Peter stopped imitating his simplicity of life and built many temples decorated with "gold and purple".
The Vatican
The most exciting moment for me was visiting the Vatican. Although it is the smallest country in the world, its power and wealth are difficult to estimate. It is also the place of office of the head of the Roman Catholic Church, who, according to 1870 dogma, is infallible when he teaches the faith. It is this infallibility that we have decided to challenge as protestants.
The Catholic Church recognizes Sunday as a holy day, while the Bible commands the Sabbath, which is Saturday. In Poland, we prepared a banner with the words "Remember the Sabbath day" and the challenge: find a biblical text ordering to celebrate Sunday and we will pay you 1000 euros. We were not original in this. The first Adventists used this method by placing ads with this content in newspapers. It's so easy to get people to read the Bible.
Saint Peter’s Square
When we arrived at St. Peter's Square, my heart was beating strongly. For centuries, many millions have lost their lives for expressing views other than the dogmas adopted by the church. When developing the banner, we took into account that it can be unpleasant, but it turned out that we attracted the attention of people in an interesting way.
Although the whole action lasted maybe 15 minutes, a few people took the challenge and began to look in the Bible for the order to ordain Sunday. Ola remembers a group of Italians,
"The boy pulled the phone with a certain face and began to read Italian quickly. After a moment he stopped and pronounced "Sabato" very slowly. He looked surprised. After a while, he searched and read aloud, and again "Sabato" could be heard. The group went away, I looked back and the boy was still standing and looking in our direction and thinking what just happened, and I was praying: "God, show him Yourself through Your Word! Let it not be just a curiosity, let he know You, who you are!"
For Zuzanna, the whole action was not obvious and had objections as to whether this is the best place and way to express our beliefs,
"After a while, I stood beside the banner without any stress and could see how many people take pictures and look for texts in the Bible. That day I realized that we are often afraid of what others will say about our beliefs. However, if we look at people as God's lost children, how much more courageously and constantly should we talk about Jesus and His plan of salvation!"
Ola summarized the whole experience in this way,
I experienced a huge blessing during these few minutes. I realized that although I live in the times of Laodicea, it does not mean that I have to accept passivity. I do not agree to this! Today I want to talk about God in various ways because I don't know what will bring tomorrow."
Just like that.
We live in a unique moment in history. We can even stand on St. Peter Square telling everyone around that Sabbath is God's day of rest. Until recently and throughout almost all history, this was impossible.
Just place a similar banner on the church building, go out into the street in your city, and people who read the Bible will start searching. How long will we have such a convenient time to preach the Gospel? The Bible says that the good times will soon be over. Let us not be passive. Let us talk about Jesus in various and powerful ways.
Pastor Marek Micyk lives in Poland. He is married to Asia, and they enjoying traveling and sharing the Everlasting Gospel.