A New Culture

At the start of Go & Tell, we discussed two big ideas: the resurrection is for you and the resurrection is cosmic. As we get to the end of the course, I want to draw those two big ideas together: Throughout the centuries, we see Jesus transforming individuals and communities to participate in his mission in remarkable ways.

Now, we must be careful: the argument isn't that Christians are morally superior to others. But it's good to celebrate how God has worked in, among, and through his people. In The Air We Breathe, Glen Scrivener shows that the historical origins for the fundamental values of Western civilization come from Christianity:

"I'm guessing that the concerns of the following chapters resonate with you: equality, compassion, consent, enlightenment, science, freedom and progress. None of these values are self-evident, nor are they widespread among the civilisations of the world. So where did they come from? The one-word answer is: Christianity."

Let's do a deep-dive into how Jesus changed how our world thinks about freedom.

In For the Glory of God, Professor Rodney Stark surveyed the global history of slavery throughout the world. He found that in nearly every culture, throughout history, slavery has both existed and been intellectually justified - from ancient civilizations to Greece and Rome, from African slavery to the Northwest Coastal Indians, from Islam to the Enlightenment philosophers.

**In light of this awful backdrop, what's unusual is the contemporary consensus that slavery is wrong.** How did we get here? Careful historical work leads to one conclusion: Christians successfully and sacrificially mobilized a movement against slavery.

In Britain, abolitionists accepted provisions to compensate the planters by an enormous sum—equal to half of the British annual budget. The debt — taken on in 1833 — was so enormous that it took the British Treasury until 2015 to pay it off!

Stark notes, "Before the Civil War was over, one Union soldier died for every ten slaves set free."

**What can generate the political will for a nation to indebt itself for generations? What can motivate people to die so that strangers might be liberated?**

Consider Acts 4:32-35: "Now the entire group of those who believed were of one heart and mind... With great power the apostles were giving testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus."

**When the resurrection of the Lord Jesus is powerfully proclaimed, lives and communities are changed.** The conviction that every image bearer deserved freedom was energized by an incomprehensibly great spiritual power - the resurrection power of Jesus.