Persecuting Jesus

Christian Nationalists in America are persecuting Jesus.  Hear how.

Read Acts 9: 1-9

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Transcript

Acts 9: 1-9

“Persecuting Jesus”

 May 4, 2025

Stephen was a disciple – not one of the original 12 but an early follower of The Way, as the first Christians were called.  He and six others were tapped to run a daily feeding program for widows.  Early Christians were particularly committed to caring for “the least of these” – but there was a controversy.  It seems that Jerusalem-based widows were being treated better than the widows who were new converts, particularly the Greek speaking ones, so Stephen and six others were chosen to organize and administer a program that ensured fairness.  

Stephen was a gifted administrator, described as “full of God’s grace and power.”  But opposition arose against Stephen by the traditionalists.  His opponents tried to debate him but they couldn’t win because of the “wisdom the Spirit gave him,” and so unable to defeat him, they dragged him in front of the Council. People presented false testimony against him, claiming, “We heard him insult Moses and God.”  Stephen defended himself but the Council believed those accusing him; they were enraged and “began to grind their teeth at Stephen.”  

They threw him out of the city and began to stone him – but not before taking off their coats to free their arms for better aim.  A young man held their coats while Stephen, rocks raining down on him, shouted, “Lord, don’t hold this sin against them.”  That man holding their coats was “in full agreement with Stephen’s murder.”  His name was Saul.

And it was from there that Saul went into full vigilante mode.  Chapter 8 describes how Saul “enthusiastically ravaged the church by entering house after house, dragging off both men and women” who belonged to the Way.  And today in chapter 9, he went to the high priest and asked for letters he could take to all the synagogues in Damascus authorizing him to take any man or woman who belonged to The Way and drag them off to prison in Jerusalem – 150 miles away, no quick trip.  It was on his way to Damascus, letters in hand, that Saul was blinded by a light and fell to the ground.  He heard a voice asking “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?”  “Who are you?”  “I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting.”  

Blinded by the encounter, Saul had to be led all the way to Damascus by hand.  Meanwhile, a disciple named Ananias heard the voice of Jesus tell him to find Saul and then “place your hands on him and restore his sight.”  “Master, you can’t be serious. Everybody’s talking about this man and his reign of terror against us!”  But, Jesus said, “he’s the one I’ve chosen.”  Ananias went and did what he was told and immediately, the scales began to fall from Saul’s eyes and he could see again.  

We can only pray that the same thing happens today – may the scales fall from the eyes of those who are persecuting Jesus.

On Monday, the Rev. William Barber was arrested for praying in the rotunda of the Capitol in Washington, DC.[1]  Not shouting, not carrying on.  Just he and two other clergy wearing their stoles quietly praying for widows not to lose their Meals on Wheels. 

Rev. Barber is a member of the Disciples of Christ, our closest sister denomination, and the founder of Moral Mondays Movement that started in North Carolina 12 years ago to protest cuts to such programs as Meals on Wheels, school lunches, and assistance for families coping with rising food costs while working minimum wage jobs.  

Jesus asked, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?”  Not, why do you persecute them, but why do you persecute me, because when you harm the poorest, you harm me.  

You may have heard of how Thomas Jefferson took a razor to his Bible to cut and paste together a book of Jesus’ teachings that excluded all the miracles and most mentions of the supernatural.  He praised what was left of Jesus’ words as “the most sublime edifice of morality which had ever been exhibited to man.”

Well, in the spirit of Thomas Jefferson, Robb Ryerse published a book that blacked out all references in the gospels to the poor, anything about humility, compassion, and love.[2]  Gone are warnings about greed, as well as calls to love and serve one another.  What remains is a gospel of spectacle – a Jesus who walks on water, performs miracles – except for feeding 5,000 freeloaders.  When Jesus gathered followers it’s not because he speaks of love and sacrifice, but because Jesus is powerful and famous.  No forgiveness or grace.  It aligns with the man who told his pastor, I want you to preach more sermons on repentance.  “OK.  What is your sin?”  “Not mine.  His!”

In this Bible, what’s left of the Lord’s Prayer?  “And when you pray, say:  Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.  Give us this day our daily bread.”  That’s it.

When Jesus said, “You have heard it said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,” he is not allowed to finish the sentence with, “but I say to you…”

In place of Jesus’ proclamation of good news to the poor, liberation of the oppressed, and freedom for the prisoner, Christian nationalism demonizes them.

·       It replaces the prophetic tradition with patriotic cheerleading.

·       It replaces the humble compassion and mercy of Jesus with a lust for power at all costs in order to control others.  

Christian nationalism is filled with enemies, threats, and endless battles to win.  It’s full of grievances and vengeance and personal glorification – not self-denial.  And Jesus said, “why are you persecuting me?”  Don’t you understand, “What you do to the least of these, my brothers and sisters, you do to me.”

That’s all Rev. Barber was trying to say.  He didn’t shout like a street-corner preacher proclaiming hell and damnation to those who do not repent, but offered peaceful prayer.  [SLIDE]  And in response, officers moved in on him with plastic handcuffs, but not before expelling any witnesses, including all the press, and slamming the door so no one could see it happening.  Rev. Barber is so disabled by chronic pain that he can barely walk, yet his quiet words were so dangerous, he had to be arrested for praying.  

You could say this is clear evidence of the government’s anti-Christian bias.  Except in this cruel twist, someone who actually quotes Jesus is the one accused of anti-Christian bias.  That’s the state of our country right now.  It’s depressing to see what is happening and I might say Christianity may be a lost cause, but then look at the dramatic story of Saul’s conversion on his way to Damascus – the OG of conversion stories.  

Saul thought he was doing the right thing – the righteous thing.  But here’s the miracle – and I do believe in miracles.  Jesus didn’t destroy Saul.  He simply disarmed him on his way to do harm.  He humbled him.  Perhaps more of a miracle, however, is that one of the people about to dragged off to prison agreed to heal the one who could have turned around and hauled him off to prison.  And then calls him “Brother Saul!”  That’s as dramatic a story of conversion as anything experienced on the Damascus Road.  Hold on to that for a minute.

It’s depressing to see what’s happening to Christianity in America.  Not the decline in numbers and influence, the closing of churches, but the real persecution of Jesus – by which I mean the betrayal of his teachings by those who claim to be Christian – not that I claim to preach a pure Christianity.  I’m as full of bias and blind spots as anyone.  I hope and pray, like Abraham Lincoln about the Civil War, not that God is on my side but that I am, however imperfectly, on the side of God.

But thank God for Rev. Barber and Bishop Maryanne Budde and others.  Their simple prophetic pleas for mercy and prayers for widows are like living water.  Progressive Christians must more emphatically, for example, pronounce blasphemy about such things as the images coming directly from the White House of the president in full papal garb – while a billion Catholics are in mourning about their beloved Pope.  This must be declared profane.    

We might feel quite hopeless right now, yet as I’ve said repeatedly, there is hope – but not just for ourselves.  The church has a big role to play for individuals struggling to cope.  How?  For one, to communicate how vitally important community is when the world feels polarized.  In place of your despair, there’s a place to serve and belong.

·       We all have a role in communicating, for example, how regularly gathering to experience joy in worship is an act of resistance against despair.  Again, you’ve heard me say this.

·       But you are living testimony of the power of spiritual communities who provide unconditional love.  You demonstrate how the words of Jesus and the invitation to social justice are the antidote to Christian nationalism.  How can you be testimony?

·       Most importantly, the Christian faith provides spiritual resources for how you are feeling right now and what we can do in response.  

I believe this.  I dare think you do too.  And if so, why keep it a secret?  This week you’re going to receive an email to help us begin to craft a message based on your experience to then spread the word:  “you can find hope and joy here too.”  When you receive our email, I ask for the gift of your time to give thoughtful reflections.

And so, back to the story.  The scales fell from Saul’s eyes.  He got up, was baptized, and went to the same synagogues where he intended to arrest members of The Way.  Instead, he began to preach that Jesus was the Christ.  Everyone who heard him was baffled and didn’t believe him.  In fact, they were so incensed they hatched a plot to kill him.  The few disciples who believed in his conversion helped him escape by lowering him in a basket through an opening in the city wall at night.  

He fled to Jerusalem but no one believed it there either.  Barnabas got some of them to reluctantly accept him but others also wanted to murder him.  A family of believers helped him escape and sent him back to his home in Tarsus.  And then we hear nothing more for quite some time.  

Later, of course, he became second in importance to Christianity only behind Jesus himself – quite a reversal of fortune, once the scales fell from his eyes.  But remember what I said earlier:  The scales fell because someone took a risk and reached out with a healing hand.  

And so, who needs conversion?  Maybe that’s you.  Maybe it’s me.  To tend the wounds of a persecuted Jesus, bringing both a prophetic word and a healing hand.  

So, Jesus, send us out to proclaim the reign of your kingdom

Send us out to proclaim and to heal

Send us out with your power and your authority

To overcome and to heal the world.

[1] https://wordandway.org/2025/04/29/rev-william-barber-arrested-in-capitol-rotunda-after-praying-against-republican-led-budget/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
[2] Robb Ryerse, The Gospel According to Donald Trump, 2025