“The Gates of Hell Shall Not Prevail Against It”

Acts 20:1–7

“When the uproar had ended, Paul sent for the disciples and, after encouraging them, said goodbye and set out for Macedonia. He traveled through that area, speaking many words of encouragement to the people, and finally arrived in Greece, where he stayed three months. Because some Jews had plotted against him just as he was about to sail for Syria, he decided to go back through Macedonia. He was accompanied by Sopater son of Pyrrhus from Berea, Aristarchus and Secundus from Thessalonica, Gaius from Derbe, Timothy also, and Tychicus and Trophimus from the province of Asia. These men went on ahead and waited for us at Troas. But we sailed from Philippi after the Festival of Unleavened Bread, and five days later joined the others at Troas, where we stayed seven days. On the first day of the week we came together to break bread. Paul spoke to the people and, because he intended to leave the next day, kept on talking until midnight.”

The Church encourages and protects. I like that having threats to his life and the Gospel, the Apostle Paul had been accompanied by his faithful friends and they went ahead securing the place where he intended to go (vv. 3–5). The Church must be a safe place and an environment in which the most vulnerable of us can rest assured of protection from outside forces until given proper due process. We do emphasise that the Church is a place of exhortation and encouragement, of growth, of discipline that builds resolve and strengthens character through the Scriptures (II Tim 3:16-17), but the Church is also a refuge for the oppressed and a sanctuary for those who seek justice. A Wall Street Journal article reported on the Catholic churches in the Philippines some weeks back: “Troubled by the violence of the antinarcotics crackdown, which has killed thousands, many priests in the Philippines have converted church buildings into hiding places, reviving an ancient church concept that leverages secular authorities’ reverence for holy places… The concept of seeking sanctuary in churches dates back centuries and, in England, provided inviolable protection from the law until the 1600s. In the Philippines, the church has sheltered fugitives since the Spanish colonial era, including the country’s first saint, Lorenzo Ruiz, who was executed by the Japanese in the 17th century for refusing to renounce his faith. In the early 1980s, during the dictatorship of former President Ferdinand Marcos, political activists sought sanctuary and the church was instrumental in Mr. Marcos’ downfall in a people power revolt in 1986. Today, church authorities here estimate that hundreds of people are living under sanctuary from the drug war.” This isn’t to coddle the guilty but to protect human rights and civil liberties, die process and the rule of law. The Church (and religion, Christianity in particular), no matter how much maligned and scorned in modern sensibilities is very much relevant to society if only for defending the weak, the marginalised, the fatherless, the prisoner, the widows, foreigners, the oppressed. The Apostle James said, Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world (Jam 1:27).” The Church offers much more than that, as the body of Christ it offers what Christ offers, a place for divine exchange in our hearts, a home where we break bread together (v. 7), a community that seeks to love and know God, and get right with Him and the society at large. The Church is not perfect, made of sinful humans depending only by faith in Christ’s grace and justification, but it is an environment where the Holy Spirit may complete His sanctifying work in us (~Heb 12:2). The Lord said: “And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it (Matt 16:18).”