{"id":45306,"date":"2022-10-01T01:46:40","date_gmt":"2022-10-01T06:46:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/god-has-a-purpose-in-allowing-persecution-bible-study\/"},"modified":"2022-10-01T01:46:40","modified_gmt":"2022-10-01T06:46:40","slug":"god-has-a-purpose-in-allowing-persecution-bible-study","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/god-has-a-purpose-in-allowing-persecution-bible-study\/","title":{"rendered":"God Has A Purpose In Allowing Persecution &#8211; Bible study"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In64 A.D., someone set fire to Rome out among the shops lining the Circus Maximus, Rome&#8217;s mammoth chariot stadium. A few days later, two-thirds of the city lay in smoldering ruins.<\/p>\n<p>A rumor spread that the emperor Nero had set the fire because he wanted to rebuild Rome to his liking. Needing a scapegoat to get himself off the proverbial hot-seat, he chose to blame a defenseless and unpopular minority  Christians.<\/p>\n<p>Because Christianity was new and its followers still relatively few, the sadistic treatment of using them as human torches to light Nero&#8217;s palace garden continued with little opposition.<\/p>\n<p>However, his persecution eventually backfired. Instead of weakening Christianity, it strengthened it. History tells us that within a few hundred years Christianity became so influential that in 380 A.D. Emperor Theodosius made it the official religion of the Roman Empire (see &#8220;The Power of the Church&#8221; heading at bottom of page).<\/p>\n<p>God has a purpose in allowing persecution (1 Peter 1:5-9 &#8211; NKJV; cf. Matthew 5:11-12 &#8211; NKJV; Romans 8:18 &#8211; NKJV; 2 Corinthians 4:17 &#8211; NKJV; James 1:2-3 &#8211; NKJV). He will use it for good if we follow the example of Christ who, &#8220;when He suffered, He &#8230;. committed Himself to Him who judges righteously&#8221; (1 Peter 2:23 &#8211; NKJV).<\/p>\n<p><strong>Related Articles:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>We Are Living In Perilous Times<\/li>\n<li>When Trouble Comes<\/li>\n<li>Our Trials Work &#8220;For Us&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Five Ways God Uses Problems<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;Why Do Good People Suffer?&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>The Christian As &#8220;Overcomer&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In64 A.D., someone set fire to Rome out among the shops lining the Circus Maximus, Rome&#8217;s mammoth chariot stadium. A few days later, two-thirds of the city lay in smoldering ruins. A rumor spread that the emperor Nero had set the fire because he wanted to rebuild Rome to his liking. Needing a scapegoat to &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/god-has-a-purpose-in-allowing-persecution-bible-study\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;God Has A Purpose In Allowing Persecution &#8211; Bible study&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45306"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45306\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}