Religion & Spirituality:Christianity
Acts 19:23-41 (NIV)
Do you think the Gospel you’ve heard or live out has the power to disrupt cultural and economic structures that don’t honor God?
Cities today are known for their architecture. Think of iconic landmarks like the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, the Empire State Building in New York City, or the Eiffel Tower in Paris. For Ephesus, the building that would have come to mind was the enormous temple to the Goddess Artemis. People from around the region would travel here to worship at her temple seeking fertility in their crops or their business or their families. And not totally unlike we do today, people would take a miniature version of whatever it is they came to ephesus to see home with them.
Metal workers across Ephesus would cash out on the sale of miniature replicas of the Goddess Artemis. But ever since this guy Paul showed up talking about the risen Jesus, fewer and fewer people seem to be interested in buying their replicas. In today’s passage this causes a riot, and it brings into sharp focus the reality that following Jesus has had an impact in society from the very beginning, and it should today too.
----------REFLECT----------
1. As you listened, and imagined yourself there, what if any emotions came up for you?
2. The cultural and economic realities of Ephesus were disrupted because people started to follow Jesus. What cultural or economic realities do you think would rightly be disrupted if people began to follow Jesus in your context?
3. The Gospel Paul preached was indeed to blame for challenging the status quo, but was preached in a way that didn’t allow anyone to hold anything against them. This often isn’t true of us, we’re either not challenging what we say and do, or we say and do things in such a way that people rightly find fault in us. Ask Jesus to help you walk this tension out today.
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