No Place Like Rome

I was reading in my ancient book today about a dispute that had happened between my religious ancestors about two thousand years ago. The people whose ancestors had written the ancient book had a very long heritage of doing things a certain way. They were arguing with one of their own, a very wise and learned man named Paul. He was considered a troublemaker because of his radical renovations in the faith that had been handed down from their ancestors. A miracle had happened - actually a whole bunch of miracles had happened - when the prophet named Jesus had recently come along speaking profound truth. And as if that wasn't enough, Jesus was healing sick people, causing the lame to walk and the blind to see. . . even (get this) raising dead people back to life. There had come a time when the religious folk had gotten so fed up with the revolutionary changes that were happening because of Jesus, they appealed to the Romans who were in charge of Israel and Judea at that time. They wanted him out of the way so they rounded up a bunch of ridiculous charges and appealed to the Romans who were in charge of that part of the world at that time. Presenting Jesus as a troublemaker who was disturbing the peace of the realm, they had gone to the Roman official who was in charge. Pilate couldn't have cared less about all this religious stuff, but he did know that he had a responsibility to his superiors in Rome, which was to keep the peace in Palestine. Long story short, he turned the prisoner, Jesus, over to the Roman centurions who were in charge of keeping the PAX ROMANA, appealing to them to put an end to this "Jesus" controversy that was stirring up so much trouble. So they did; they put an end to the problem, Roman style. They nailed him to a cross and let him hang there until he bled out and died. Not to worry, however. . . Jesus was raised up from his tomb, by the Creator of the Universe, his Father. . . raised up on the the third day after his crucifixion. Now, back to the Paul incident that I mentioned earlier. . . a few years after the Resurrection . . .So this Paul, formerly a hyper-religious guy, a Pharisee, had been one of those who attacked the Christians as a bunch of troublemakers. But he had had a change of heart when the Creator of the Universe had stopped him in his tracks and told him to straighten up his act, and to stop killing Christians and . . . get this. . . even become a Christian believer, himself - his own bad self! As the next few years went by, Paul went all around those regions of the Roman empire preaching the gospel of resurrection in Jesus, and being "born again," as this writer is, even here and now in 2026 A.D. But when Paul made a return trip to his old stomping grounds, he was put on trial by the religious folk for being a troublemaker all over the Roman realm, and when it got so intense that the extremists were calling for his execution, he made use of his "born a Roman citizen" rights by demanding a trial. And in the trial, Paul said: "If then, I am a wrongdoer and have committed anything worthy of death, I do not refuse to die, but if none of those things is true of which these men accuse me, no one can hand me over to them, "I appeal to Caesar!" Then Festus, the clueless Roman governor said: "You have appealed to Caesar; to Caesar you shall go" And so Paul was put on a ship and sent to Rome, where he spent the rest of his life in prison.

But a funny thing happened on the way to world history. The city where Paul was imprisoned - that's the Roman capital where apostle Peter was also imprisoned - that city, Rome, became the focal point of the gospel and Christian the faith for the next 1500 years. Jesus knew what he was talking about when he spoke these words to Peter: "Upon this rock, I build my church." You see, all things are possible with God, the Creator of the Universe. It just so happened that about 300 years later, a Roman emperor, Constantine, turned to Jesus. He initiated the empire infrastructure that, as history rolled along, presented the gospel message to the world. Now I was raised in the Roman Catholic faith. In my adulthood, I turned to a more gospel-centric gathering of Christ believers. This morning while reading the ancient book, I was thanking God for the church of Rome that had spread the gospel around the world for 1500 years before the reformers came along and guided the gospel emphasis from a sacrificial bread and wine and a set of rules to the "born again" salvation message of the Reformation gospel. And now that my granddaughter is attending a Roman Catholic school, I'm like. . . I'm okay with that. After all, I attended Catholic schools for thirteen years before launching my life into the wide, wide world. Lastly, when Pat and I visited Rome a few years ago, when our daughter was studying abroad (thanks to the University of North Carolina "study abroad" program) we saw the prison where apostles Peter and Paul had been locked up, back in the day, in a time and a place, long ago and far, far away, Rome! There's no place like Rome. King of Soul