During the first few centuries that the church existed, it face a handful of internal struggles on top of persecution from the Roman Empire and hostile neighbors. Most of the struggle, both internally and externally, came about because the gospel was intellectually/culturally unacceptable throughout the ancient world.
One of the first internal struggles the church faced was a movement called “Gnosticism.” Gnosticism was an attempt to take Christianity and mix it with Roman mystery religions. These mystery religions were very popular throughout the 2nd and 3rd century. Some folks looked at these movements and thought, “If we could just be more like them, then the church would be more popular and grow faster.” The problem is that the changes they made to make it more popular, made it into something that wasn’t what Jesus and the apostles taught. Over time, the mystery religions died out before the Christianity even became a legal religion. As it turned out, the trendy thing was less durable than the foundational truths of the gospel.
Gnosticism wasn’t the only instance of Christians in history looking at trendy things and saying, “If we make the faith more like this new and popular thing, then it will be better.” In each instance, the trendy new idea ran out of gas once the newness wore off and was replaced by the next trendy new idea. When the Byzantine Empire fell, scholars flooded into Europe bringing Ancient Greek philosophy with them. Medieval theologians saw the ancient works becoming trendy and wasted no time adapting the faith to fit them. Ultimately, those influences waned and went away. Later during the Enlightenment, theologians saw the popularity of the new ideas and tried to make Christianity fit. Over and over again the popular thing has come and gone. In the 18th century, it was existentialism. In the 20th century, it was Marxism. Each time, the trendy new thing came and went while message of Jesus and the gospel has proven resilient.
I was thinking about this idea today, which brought to mind the parable Jesus told about two men who built houses. One built on a foundation of sand, while the other built using a large stone foundation. When wind and floods came, the house on the sand foundation collapsed, while the other persevered. Jesus explained that anyone who built their life on His teachings was like the man who built on stone. Lives rooted in truth and God’s will stand tests and hold firm.
The parable is specifically about how we live, though it strikes me as interesting that the teachings of the church have persevered. The deep foundation of the gospel and the scriptures has endured where every other trendy philosophy and religion has not. Gnosticism came and went, but Christianity continued to grow and ultimately changed the world.
For us today, this is worth considering. It’s easy to choose to live by what feels good or what is popular. In truth, both will change and shift. Finding eternal, immutable truth to build your life on is wise.
