Plinius was famous for letters, which have been rightly dubbed literary classics; however, he is equally famous—and you don’t find as much written about this in the literature—for the interrogation, torture, and murder of Christians. By his own account, he extracted information from two church deaconesses, and he did it by torture. His manner was to ask three times whether or not you were a follower of Jesus Christ, and if your answer was “yes,” he wrote, “I then ordered them to be taken away to be executed.” Now if a person responded by denying the faith, Plinius had them repeat an invocation to the gods, offer rites with wine and incense before the statue of Trajan, and then utter imprecations at the same time against the very name of Christus. For Plinius the end game was simply this: It was the reclamation of multitudes from the worship of Jesus Christ to the worship of Caesar.

Plinius was confident that through intimidation and threat of death, the tide of Christianity could be stemmed. In the end of course, he was wrong. He was wrong for one singular reason: the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

The early Christians had seen the resurrected Christ, and their lives were radically impacted. They no longer lived for prosperity, for the favor of Caesar, but they lived for eternal verities. For this reason, they turned an empire upside-down, for out of the bowels of the Roman Empire would come the greatest civilization in the history of the planet. A civilization founded on the DNA of biblical manuscripts. A civilization that recognized Christ had been raised from the dead.

All of this is but a prologue to something that I want to put into your hands, something that allows you with passion and purpose to communicate the truth of resurrection.

Christ rose from the dead. Now that’s not just a historical reality, though we’re going to talk about how it is a historical reality, but it is something that has implications for you right now. If it is indeed true that Christ rose from the dead, it means you too will rise. If it is not true, it means your faith is useless and so is this broadcast. It all hinges on whether or not Christ rose from the dead.

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One of the secrets of growth in the early Christian church was the testimony of its love. The love of Christ not only compelled early Christians to be ambassadors but constrained the world to take note of these ambassadors as well. The love of Christ was so contagious that it swept through the Roman Empire like wild fire.

The early Christian church transformed an empire not only through the testimony of its love but also through the testimony of its lips. The book of Acts in particular tells us that on the day that Stephen was martyred “a great persecution broke out against the church in Jerusalem and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria”(Acts 8:1) Those who were scattered preached the word wherever they went. I think therein is the secret of growth in the early Christian church: every believer was a witness for Christ.

While it is true that not everyone is called to be an evangelist, everyone is called to evangelize. That’s why we here at the Christian Research Institute and Bible Answer Man radio broadcast take seriously the task of equipping for “works of service so that the body of Christ may be built up” (Eph. 4:12).

Of course closely related to the testimony of our lips is the testimony of our lives. I remember the story of a man who was working in a factory in the north of England. He was standing on a ladder and lost his balance and was skewered on a red hot metal disc and his workmates ran around frantically looking for a doctor, and the man cried out, “Forget the doctor. I’m dying. Can anyone tell me how to get right with God?” Of the more than 300 men in the factory, not one stepped forward. Later one of the men confessed that he could have stepped forward but the testimony of his life had long ago silenced the testimony of his lips.

If we testify only by our lives, we’re in danger of testifying only to ourselves. On the other hand, if our lives belie the testimony of our lips, we might well be dragging the name of Christ through the mud. We have to testify both by our lives and our lips. It is clear to me that it is not the pastor’s calling to do the work of ministry by himself. The pastor is called to “prepare God’s people for works of service so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature” (Eph 4:12-13).

I want to ask you a question as we start this broadcast. Are you missing one of the most exhilarating and fulfilling dimensions of the Christian life? Are you missing the thrill of being a witness for Jesus Christ? To answer those questions and much more, I had Lee Strobel and Mark Mittelberg on the April 21^st and 22^nd shows of the Bible Answer Man discussing their new book The Unexpected Adventure: Taking Everyday Risks to Talk with People About Jesus. I highly recommend picking up a copy, you can do so at our website of www.equip.org or by calling us at 1-888-700-0274.

WHAT WERE THE MYSTERY RELIGIONS?

Other than Judaism and Christianity, the mystery religions were the most influential religions in the early centuries after Christ. The reason these cults were called “mystery religions” is that they involved secret ceremonies known only to those initiated into the cult. The major benefit of these practices was thought to be some kind of salvation.

The mystery religions were not, of course, the only manifestations of the religious spirit in the eastern Roman Empire. One could also find public cults not requiring an initiation ceremony into secret beliefs and practices. The Greek Olympian religion and its Roman counterpart are examples of this type of religion.

Each Mediterranean region produced its own mystery religion. Out of Greece came the cults of Demeter and Dionysus, as well as the Eleusinian and Orphic mystery religions, which developed later.² Asia Minor gave birth to the cult of Cybele, the Great Mother, and her beloved, a shepherd named Attis. The cult of Isis and Osiris (later changed to Serapis) originated in Egypt, while Syria and Palestine saw the rise of the cult of Adonis. Finally, Persia (Iran) was a leading early locale for the cult of Mithras, which — due to its frequent use of the imagery of war — held a special appeal to Roman soldiers. The earlier Greek mystery religions were state religions in the sense that they attained the status of a public or civil cult and served a national or public function. The later non-Greek mysteries were personal, private, and individualistic.

Mystery Religion- Basic Traits

One must avoid any suggestion that there was one common mystery religion. While a tendency toward eclecti­cism or synthesis developed after A.D. 300, each of the mystery cults was a separate and distinct religion during the century that saw the birth of the Christian church. Moreover, each mystery cult assumed different forms in different cultural settings and underwent significant changes, especially after A.D. 100. Nevertheless, the mystery religions exhibited five common traits.

(1) Central to each mystery was its use of an annual vegetation cycle in which life is renewed each spring and dies each fall. Followers of the mystery cults found deep symbolic significance in the natural processes of growth, death, decay, and rebirth.

(2) As noted above, each cult made important use of secret ceremonies or mysteries, often in connection with an initiation rite. Each mystery religion also passed on a “secret” to the initiate that included information about the life of the cult’s god or goddess and how humans might achieve unity with that deity. This “knowledge” was always a secret or esoteric knowledge, unattainable by any outside the circle of the cult.

(3) Each mystery also centered around a myth in which the deity either returned to life after death or else triumphed over his enemies. Implicit in the myth was the theme of redemption from everything earthly and temporal. The secret meaning of the cult and its accompanying myth was expressed in a “sacramental drama” that appealed largely to the feelings and emotions of the initiates. This religious ecstasy was supposed to lead them to think they were experiencing the beginning of a new life.

(4) The mysteries had little or no use for doctrine and correct belief. They were primarily concerned with the emotional life of their followers. The cults used many different means to affect the emotions and imaginations of initiates and hence bring about “union with the god”: processions, fasting, a play, acts of purification, blazing lights, and esoteric liturgies. This lack of any emphasis on correct belief marked an important difference between the mysteries and Christianity. The Christian faith was exclusivistic in the sense that it recognized only one legitimate path to God and salvation, Jesus Christ. The mysteries were inclusivistic in the sense that nothing prevented a believer in one cult from following other mysteries.

(5) The immediate goal of the initiates was a mystical experience that led them to feel they had achieved union with their god. Beyond this quest for mystical union were two more ultimate goals: some kind of redemption or salvation, and immortality.

Mystery Religion- Evolution

Before A.D. 100, the mystery religions were still largely confined to specific localities and were still a relatively novel phenomenon. After A.D. 100, they gradually began to attain a widespread popular influence throughout the Roman Empire. But they also underwent significant changes that often resulted from the various cults absorbing elements from each other. As devotees of the mysteries became increasingly eclectic in their beliefs and practices, new and odd combinations of the older mysteries began to emerge. And as the cults continued to tone down the more objectionable features of their older practices, they began to attract greater numbers of followers.