Where the Church First Fled

Well, good morning, everyone. Good afternoon, I should say. Good to see all of you. Be with you here today. Beautiful Sabbath. Been a beautiful week in many ways, and a lot of us, I'm sure, have been working in our yards getting things done besides mowing, planting flowers, getting things looking more like spring, and fixing things around. I've been able to do that in and amongst other things that have been going on this week. We have scheduled the Bible study for this Sabbath.

My first split here this afternoon will be the Bible study. A portion of it. We have a guest speaker with us this afternoon, one of our elders from the Cambridge, Ohio congregation, Mr. John Miller, is with us this week. He'll be giving us the second message this afternoon, so you can consider my first part of the split here this afternoon, the Bible study portion of the normal Sabbath. I have been preparing my annual trip to the Ambassador Bible Center, which will be a week after next for the opportunity to teach the class that I have on early church history.

Every year I add material to that and I revamp and revise it. What you're going to see here this afternoon is new material that I'm going to insert into the class, but it has a connection to this time of the year, and I think will also be helpful and interesting to you.

It will spin off of a little bit of the trip that we had to Israel and Jordan a year ago, two years ago now, and some of the things that we saw over there that I've been able to incorporate into this. I don't think I've shown you this portion of that particular trip, so you'll get a little bit of material there. We always have a fascination in the church, or at least we have had for a number of years, about some of the scriptures that talk about the protection that God promises to His church and the various scriptures that talk about the church removing into her place, as Revelation 12 talks about, and places where God has prepared for the church to be spared various things, especially the scriptures that talk about that of the coming tribulation.

The title of my presentation here this afternoon is, When the Church First Fled. Some of us may not be aware that the church has already fled in the past, not today, so don't worry if you think you got left behind. That hasn't happened. But the church fled at one point. We're going to talk about that this afternoon and learn a little bit about this episode from a very earliest period of the church's experience and one of the fascinating stories that is available to us, not only from the scriptures, but also from the little bit of history that we know about.

Let's first get our bearings. I want to talk just a little bit here about the first century, our setting, which is Jerusalem. This is a representation of the Temple and the city of Jerusalem, kind of a fanciful representation of the first century setting for Jerusalem. This is the period of the Roman occupation of Jerusalem, the time of the Second Temple. The Temple that you see here is what is called in history the Second Temple.

It was the one rebuilt by Herod the Great and was not as glorious, not as fine and opulent as the Temple that Solomon built. But this is the Second Temple period, the time of the first century and obviously the time of Jesus Christ's appearance on the scene, his ministry, and the beginning of the church that we read about in the book of Acts, beginning on the day of Pentecost in 31 A.D.

So that is our setting for this particular period of time. Jerusalem, in the first century, the Roman Jerusalem that we might call it under Herod the Great, had been rebuilt and expanded. It was quite a significant city for its size. This is a scaled model of the city of Jerusalem. This is what used to be a place called the Holy Land Hotel in Jerusalem.

And you could go there and see this. In fact, we saw it two years ago when we were there, but they were beginning to dismantle this scaled model, which has been there for a number of years, and they were going to move it someplace else. I think their condos are built on this site today, where it was, but it was a scale model, and is a scale model, where it's relocated to, of Jerusalem. And here you see some of the opulent palaces and buildings built by Herod the Great. So Jerusalem was a significant metropolitan city. Not only the temple was awesome, but many of the other buildings and the outdoor locations that they had built and established in order to facilitate the Romans who were there, and the commerce and the trade and the facilities of the of the city as they were being conducted.

Jerusalem, as far as the Church is concerned, and those Jews who were practicing Jews in the first century, would be coming and going in and out of Jerusalem throughout the year.

But the largest influx of visitors to Jerusalem would always be during one of the Holy Day periods, one of the festival periods, which would be among those mentioned in the litigus 23 in the Greek three seasons, the spring, the early summer of Pentecost, and then in the fall, pilgrims would go to Jerusalem. And this is a scene that depicts pilgrims coming into Jerusalem and going up to the temple as it stood there, and the population of Jerusalem would swell many times over from its normal time, just like our cities do today.

Here in a few weeks, two weeks, the city of Indianapolis will swell in its population many times more than what it is whenever we have our festival of the Indianapolis 500. And so, the same thing goes on today. This is what was taking place in Jerusalem as people would go up to observe the various festivals.

Let's center at least on the festival of Pentecost, which for us we know is two weeks off, two weeks from tomorrow. We will be convening on the Holy Day to keep the Feast of Pentecost. We know from the book of Acts, when we read as to what took place there, the giving of the Holy Spirit, we mark Pentecost as the time of the beginning of the church. That's the birthday of the church, the day that it actually began in terms of the New Testament period of the church, with the tongues of fire and the experience.

And Peter's sermon there in Acts chapter 2, a significant event. And no doubt we'll talk more about that as we keep the Feast of Pentecost. But that's where the church began. And we read about the church in the book of Acts, their zeal, their growth, their issues, when questions would arise, and various things they had to settle, they settled the issue of circumcision and how to deal with gentiles coming into the church.

Peter received his vision of the blanket or the cloth let down from heaven and the various things on it. And he, through that, understood that the gentiles had now the opportunity to come into the church and to be a part of salvation. That salvation was not just to the descendants of Abraham, but the gentiles now had an open door into the church.

The church had to work their way through that, as well as a number of other issues, but it mushroomed.

It multiplied, as we see in the book of Acts. And tens of thousands of people were in the church of God during this period of time. One estimate that I've read from history, which, again, you wonder if it's accurate, but they feel by the end of the first century there were 100,000 members of the church, 100,000 Christians throughout the Roman Empire, where the church had started from, let's say, Jerusalem to Rome through the Mediterranean area. I don't know which particular pole, if it was a Gallop pole or a Zodbi pole, that they based that particular information on, but that's the guesstimate that they have for that period of time.

Now, in Jerusalem, the center of Jewish thought, Jewish habit, Jewish custom was the temple. And, of course, in the book of Acts, chapter 2, where were the members gathered on that day of Pentecost?

We all know that they were in the temple. They were in the temple precincts. They weren't in the actual sanctuary building of the temple, but understand that the temple had other buildings in the precincts that you can see in part by this picture here. So it was somewhere in the outer part of this area in the precincts of the temple that the church was meeting on the day of Pentecost, when this dramatic miracle took place. And this is where they were, but this is right in the center in the heart of Jerusalem, is where the church had its place and its being. And, of course, it grew and went out from there. But this is perhaps a fairly accurate representation of what that temple may have looked like. It's the traditional one, at least, that has come down from archaeologists and historians and trying to piece together the information that we have to give us an idea of what it looked like, but it's as good a representation as any in terms of what was taking place there.

This is the inner area of the temple sanctuary. This gives you a little bit of view when you would walk through the front door of that temple and into this inner area, this is where you would find yourself if you were a priest. If you were not a priest, you wouldn't be normally going in here. You see the menorah, the seven-branched candle stand back there. This is the great veil of the temple that separated the Holy of Holies from the outer part here. This, remember, was what was rent in to when Christ died. On the very hour and very moment that He died, this veil was rent in to miraculously, but behind that veil was the Holy of Holies. Now, what's interesting to note, and at least at this point, let's just think about the church, think about the work of the church. The book of Acts tells us that the church spread beyond Jerusalem. Paul took the gospel to all corners of the Mediterranean, along with the other apostles, and we read about that in the book of Acts, and the church multiplied it and grew. But there was always a center and a focus on this building, even for the church members. Even though theologically and spiritually, they understood that Jesus' sacrifice removed the need for this building and all of the sacrifices that were done there. However, there was still an honor that was paid to that. We find that Paul even went up and made sacrifices there when he was breaking a Nazarite ballot one time. And so, there was a respect and was a part of their culture and tradition. They understood its place within the history of Israel. They also had a correct understanding of the place of the temple and the sacrifices within their new understanding under what we would call the New Covenant since the death of Christ. They knew that the blood of the bulls and goats were not necessary to forgive sin, but they also understood the long line of tradition here. There is a story that is interesting to note because the average Church of God member at this time in the story understood this building. And those who lived in Jerusalem, in one sense, their lives and their culture still circulated around this building.

But as the decades went on, a number of things began to change within Jerusalem. And by the time of the late 60s, 66, 67, 68, and 69 AD, the Jews were beginning to revolt against Rome. And as a result, they had brought the wrath of the Roman armies and the Roman Emperor upon them. And the Roman armies had come to Jerusalem to put down the rebellion. And in about the year 66, 67 AD, we're not exactly sure of the date, but 66 is one time that is given, sacrifices were going on in the temple. And on the day of Pentecost in that year, the priests were in this building in the evening hours. And we have a story that is very interesting that I want to read to you. It comes from a first century historian by the name of Josephus. How many of you know who Josephus was?

I love to ask this question. Raise your hands. How many of you know who Josephus was? Okay. How many of you do not know who Josephus was? Be honest. Okay. Two. Okay, great. The rest, those of you just don't want to raise your hand. I understand that. Josephus is the fifth gospel. No, not really. When I first came into church many, many moons ago, and I started listening to sermons, setting out and listening and hearing all these things, ministers were quoting Josephus. I thought, who is Josephus? I've never heard of Josephus either.

And I thought he was some... I said, Josephus. I know both of us, but I don't know Josephus.

I thought Josephus was some distant relative of my mother. My mother's name was Josephine.

That's a name you don't hear it anymore, unless you're studying French history and you understand the wife of Napoleon, who was named Josephine. But my mom's name is Josephine, and I thought Josephus. That must be some of her ancient relatives, but it wasn't. Josephus was a Jewish historian, first century, and he wrote a great deal about the period in Jewish history and the period of his time. And we used to quote him a lot more than we do in the church, and I have to ask this every time I give this class, because most of the kids at ABC never heard of Josephus. They just don't know who he was. And I'm surprised you don't know, because you were sitting in my class 20 years ago, whenever I first gave this, and you should have known that. Anyway, you weren't there. You were in the back row that day, and you weren't listening. I know.

That's another story. Okay. Josephus tells us a story from his history of this period of time, and listen to this. It's a fascinating story from the period. He records that on the day of Pentecost in 66 AD, there was a voice heard in this temple. And here's a quote from his history. It says, Moreover, at that feast, which we call Pentecost, as the priests were going by night into the inner temple, into this very place in here, to perform their sacred ministrations, they said that they heard a great noise, and after that, they heard a sound as of a great multitude saying, Let us remove hints. And so the priests were in this temple at night on the day of Pentecost, and they heard this voice, a disembodied voice that says, Let us remove here from here. Hints.

Let us remove from here. That word got around, and as a result, the church members of the Church of God in Jerusalem at that time heard new enough to obey that voice. Roman armies were already moving in, and they removed. They got out of town. They fled. This we know from the histories and from the story, because what then ensued in Jerusalem in the coming years was an encirclement of the city, the starvation of thousands of people and Jews, and Josephus Goodson of some very gory gruesome details about what happened during the siege of Jerusalem by the Roman armies during this time.

Eventually, in 70 AD, four years later, the temple and the city was burnt, and that temple was raised to the ground. It was a tremendous major event in the history of Jerusalem, the Jews, and especially the church. But what is interesting is we know that the church had fled from the city of Jerusalem. I'd say a majority of them had. I don't think that every single man, woman, and child or elderly person got out of town just knowing how life works. Sometimes, you know, it was just things, sometimes people just couldn't go. I'm sure there were people that were too old, too infirmed, but many did leave. Why did they leave? What caused them to do so? Well, let's turn, if you will, turn over to the book of Luke chapter 21. Luke chapter 21. The reason they took that voice seriously is that they remembered what was said here in the Gospels, or at least through Christ's teaching, and as they had had this handed down to them.

In Luke 21, in this version of the Olivet prophecy, beginning in verse 20, we have what Jesus prophesied. When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near.

He said this to his disciples several years earlier from this event. It was a prophecy.

They took it literally. A few decades later, by 66 AD, many who had heard this story in the scripture read to them, and the story told over and over and over again through many sermons and times of explanation, they remembered what was said. It is said in verse 21, Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, but those who are in the midst of her depart, and let not those who are in the country enter her, enter the city.

For as for these are the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled, and go to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days, for there will be great distress in the land, and wrath upon this people.

And they will fall by the edge of the sword, and be led away captive into all nations, and Jerusalem will be trampled by Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.

Now, Christ ultimately had a longer view of this taking place on into our day today, but there was a generation of church members who literally lived through this, and they looked at these scriptures and they heeded the warning. That's why in 66 AD, when the word got around that this voice in the temple had boomed out, let us remove hence the church members hearkened back to what they had been hearing and known these years. Armies were around Jerusalem. What would you do? What would you do?

Written an apartment. You do what they did. You would leave, and they did. And those members who did leave escaped the destruction of the city, the starvation, Josephus records that mothers were even eating their own children. Cannibalism took place. It's a very gruesome detail and period of time that took place in that city. Where did they go? Where did the church flee to?

Well, it's a good question, but let's look at where they went because we know from history what happened to them. They went from Jerusalem, right here, northeast to a city called Pella.

They crossed the Jordan River, and they went into a, interestingly, hilly area. I wouldn't call it mountains by our standard of mountains, but if you go to Pella today, it is rather hilly. And this is where they went. And you can go there today. Some of us went there a couple of years ago, and, God willing, I'm going to get a chance to go back there again this fall for the Feast of Tabernacles to Jordan. We got approval to go there this year, a few days ago. And we're going to have another church service in Pella, as we did two years ago. I'll show you that in a few minutes. But this is the Jordan River, running down from the Sea of Galilee, down toward the Red Sea. And these members hightailed it out of Jerusalem, walked, rode donkeys and carts, and went what is rather a short distance into what is modern-day Jordan. You cross the Jordan today going to the east, and you're in Jordan. You cross the Jordan River, going east, and you are then in Jordan. In Pella today, this particular city, the remnants of it, is in modern Jordan. This is where the city, the members fled. And this is what the area looks like. And you can see these kind of low-lying hills here. This is the Jordan River Valley over here. And this is Israel today to the far west from this perspective, looking out over there. And this is the city, this is the area of the city of Pella. So Jerusalem would be way off down here, a little bit further out off the picture. But when you go to Pella today and you get up on the highest hill there, you can look out and you'll be looking over into the Jordan Valley area and Israel beyond. But this is the city of Pella, as it, the remains of it at least, and it's just a small village, small arid village remaining there. But archaeologists have been working for several years to excavate the city. And there are ruins there of a temple and of various buildings. And this is one of those right here. This is, I think, the same temple from a vantage point of where I happened to be. I took this picture of an old temple, ancient temple that they've uncovered there. The University of Sydney from Australia has been conducting an archaeological dig there for a number of years. So there's ongoing work and an effort to recover the city from what it looked like here in the ancient world. This is an interesting picture. I got this one off the internet and it shows kind of an area where you've got some steps here and some archways here. You're looking out over the hills and the valleys that surround the area of Pella. But this is where we had church, on these steps, is where we had the church service. You see the pillars of the ancient temple down in there. And we were overlooking that. This is the crowd that we had that day two years ago during the Feast of Tabernacles, 2005, in Jordan. And we all got on our buses one morning and drove up to Pella. Got there in time to have services. And you think some of the metal chairs that you set on in various places are a problem.

Okay, is it working now? I'll just stand in front of this. Okay, so this is the group that we had. This is Corey Erickson, one of our elders who coordinates the feast there. And we're going to have a group of, looks like, about 60 to 75 members that will be going to Jordan this year, a much, much smaller group.

But this was a unique experience for us to have this church service in Pella because, as I said at the time, Scott Ashley gave a sermon that day. And I said to them, I had a chance to give a little bit of this information as kind of a mini-sermonette in advance of the sermon that day. Possibly, what was this gathering here was the first time the Feast of Tabernacles had been kept in Pella since the first century.

Possibly. There may have been other groups there. Corey told me that he had been there on a Sabbath with some people a number of years ago when he worked on one of our projects in Amman, Jordan. But in terms of the size of the group and however you want to spin it, you can say at least this was the largest group or the only group or whatever.

You have to say something. You know, they get something really dramatic out of an event like this since the first century. I would definitely say it's probably the largest church of God member since the first century that was keeping a service there during the Feast in Pella since the time of the first century. And as I said, I got a chance just to give a little bit of this information before the sermon.

But this gives you a view, again, of some of the work that's being done. Again, the Jordan River Valley and the hills of Israel off to the side. It was an interesting spot. We'll be going back to the same spot this year to keep the feast of parties part of the feast while we're in Jordan this year.

Now, what we need to understand about this group of people who went to Jordan and Pella in the first century is this. We know a little bit about them. Actually, quite a bit for a group of people outside of the Book of Acts. We know quite a bit about these people. There's an interesting article from the Encyclopedia Britannica, the 11th edition, which is over 100 years old, let's say. And you will not find this in the current edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

But it does give us a little bit of background compiling from accounts closer to this period of time and tells us about this group of people. I want to read this to you. It's from the article entitled Nazarenes. Now, they call these people who went there ultimately in history. This portion of the Church of God are known to us in history as Nazarenes. Before I read this, let me just take you back to the Book of Acts. You will turn over to Acts 24.

Just to show you the connection, because in the Book of Acts, we do have reference to the fact that the people of God were called Nazarenes. In Acts 24 and verse 5, Paul was on trial here at this point. Acts 24 verse 5, and the charges being read out about him here in verse 5, we'll just jump to it says, for we have found this man, meaning Paul, a plague, a creator of dissension among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes.

Now, they were called Nazarenes. Why? Why do you think they were called Nazarenes? Sir? Who was from Nazareth? Jesus. Yeah. They were called Nazarenes because they were followers of Jesus, whose hometown was Nazareth. And so that's the connection. So right there from the Book of Acts, we have that reference to them. And so the members of the church that fled Jerusalem are known to us from history, and they're called Nazarenes. And that is the interesting connection there. But this article from the Encyclopedia Britannica, let me just read it to you.

It says, the Nazarenes were an obscure Jewish Christian sect.

Jewish Christian. Note that. That's always an interesting little marker when you read history about the church. They settled in Pella from the time of the flight of the Jewish Christians from Jerusalem immediately before the siege in AD 70. They are characterized as neither more nor less than Jews, pure and simple. But it goes on to describe what their beliefs were. It says that they recognized the new covenant as well as the old. They recognized the new covenant as well as the old. They believed in the resurrection and in the one God and his Son Jesus Christ.

So far, you could pretty well agree with that, couldn't you? They believed in the one God and his Son Jesus Christ. It goes on to say that it cannot be said whether their Christological views were identical with those of a heretic called Serenthus. But it goes on the article. It says, Jerome, writing in the fourth, fifth century, says that they believed in Christ, the Son of God, born of the Virgin Mary, who suffered under Pontius Pilate and rose again. So they believed that Christ was born of a virgin, that he died, and that he was resurrected. So right again, right down the line is what they believed in. So they were Jews who believed, the point they're making in this article, they were Jews who believed in Christ as the born of a virgin and the Son of God who died and was resurrected. But Jerome says about them, and this is a quote from the church father, Jerome, desiring to be both Jews and Christians, they are neither the one nor the other.

Let me read that again. Desiring to be both Jews and Christians, they are neither the one nor the other. Now this was written in the fifth century by a church father named Jerome who's trying to describe these people, and his explanation is classic. He's saying these people wanted it both ways. They wanted to be Jews and they wanted to be Christians. It's pretty well what can be said of you and I. We want to be Jews, but we want to be Christians, as somebody would try to explain us. We keep the Sabbath, we keep the Holy Days, we keep the dietary laws, but we believe in Jesus Christ. And from their eyes, we'd be Jewish Christian. And so this is how they're describing this group of the Nazarenes. It goes on to say that they used the Aramaic recension of the Gospel according to Matthew, which they called the Gospel to the Hebrews.

But while adhering as far as possible to the Mosaic way as regarding circumcision, Sabbath, or it says Sabbath, in other words, they kept the Holy Days too, foods and the like, they did not refuse to recognize the apostolicity of Paul or the rights of the Gentile Christians.

And this explanation from this Encyclopedia Britannica is dead on describing the group. And again, everything that every bit of the description fits you and I and the Church of God today in terms of what we are and what we believe. This is who these people were. This is what they came to believe and held on to in their exile from the city of Jerusalem after that eighth decade of the first century. Now, it's interesting, the story that we have about these people can be pieced together from a number of sources. These members stayed here for 50-60 years after 70 AD. They got word that the city had been destroyed, the temple at least had been destroyed, and the Romans had sacked much of the city.

But here they were now, let's say they were what today would be roughly 100 miles away from Jerusalem, but that's a long distance in those days. And the decades go on, and what we know from the histories Edward Gibbon in his 15th chapter of his book, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, he talks about the same group of people, the Nazarenes who fled to Pella. And he tells us as he has pieced it together from, again, other sources from Jerome and Eusebius and other historians, that these members held to their belief.

They stayed faithful to the truth once delivered. They kept the Sabbath, the Holy Days, they kept the food laws, they believed right down the line, decade after decade. But there was this affinity for Jerusalem, because that's where their home was, that's in a sense where their home church was, the temple, and all of that, the vast history, and there was this affinity and this desire to go back. And as the decades wore on, eventually we find that some of them did go back and visit from the stories we're told, but they maintained their basic residency in Pella. But by the year 130-135, there had been another invasion of Roman troops into Jerusalem, and this time under the Emperor Hadrian, he had destroyed the whole city.

He just leveled it. He said, I'm going to get rid of these pesky Jews. They've been causing us too many problems for too many years. We're going to get rid of them. And yet there was still a desire from the members in this church in Pella to go back to Jerusalem, and some of them did. A core of them stayed in Pella, but another group went back to Jerusalem. And what we know from the story and the history of those that went back to Jerusalem is in order to gain access to the city, because what Hadrian did when he, when the Roman legions left the city, he left behind a cohort to guard the city passes so that the Jews would not be able to go back in and go up on the temple area.

But here were a group of church members who wanted to go back and re-establish residency there, and with a leader that they elected, a man by the name of Marcus, they set up a congregation back in Jerusalem. And in order to be able to gain access to the city and to the Temple Mount area where the temple once stood, they had to compromise their beliefs. And they essentially renounced anything that was connected with anything Jewish, which meant that they quit keeping the Sabbath and the Holy Days.

They started eating pig and everything else so that they could no longer be considered Jews. And therefore, they could go into the city, go up on the Temple Mount, do what they wanted, or just be near that and to have an identity there. And Gibbon says they became part of the Catholic Church. And when Gibbon says the Catholic Church, at that time he was talking, not so much about the Roman Catholic Church that we look at, but what became the Roman Catholic Church.

In other words, this group of members went back to Jerusalem and they compromised their beliefs, they changed their teachings, in order to have not looked like Jews and to be able to go freely in and out of the city. Does that sound familiar? Meanwhile, the members who stayed in Pella kept their identity by keeping their belief. And they eventually melt into history, and it gets foggier and foggier as the years go by.

But it's an interesting and it's a fascinating story for this particular period about the Church and when they fled. And those who went back to Jerusalem, this is what they found. They found a Temple Mount area in Jerusalem with the rocks piled on one another from the Temple area, had been thrown down. And they rebuilt, in time, Jerusalem was rebuilt by other cultures down through the years, but it was never the same.

It was just never the same and became a different story. So, what do we learn from this? A number of things we could learn possibly, but there's one lesson I'd like to take us through here briefly in conclusion. Turn over to Acts chapter 7. This is where the picture's in, folks, and where you get interactive. Acts chapter 7.

This is Stephen's famous defense of his faith, as he was called up before the Jewish leaders at the time. Let's look at what Stephen said here, because it offers us a lesson. Stephen understood this very early in the game. This was in the 30s A.D. when he got martyred. Remember, he was one of the earliest martyrs when he was stoned to death after this. But this part of his famous sermon to the Jews goes here beginning in verse 44. He says, Our fathers had the tabernacle of witness in the wilderness, and as he appointed, instructing Moses to make it according to the pattern that he had seen, which our fathers, having received it in turn, also brought with Joshua into the land possessed by the Gentiles, whom God drove out before the face of our fathers until the days of David, who found favor before God, and asked to find a dwelling for the God of Jacob.

But Solomon built him a house. This is a very quick overview of Israelite history. However, the Most High does not dwell in temples, made with hands, as the prophet says. And then this quote, Heaven is my throne, and earth is my footstool. What house will you build for me, says the Lord?

Or what is the place of my rest? Has my hand not made all these things?

This is what Stephen quoted to the Jewish leaders here, as to what he had already grasped as a result of the death of Jesus, the beginning of the church, the new covenant, and this new experience. He understood the history of Israel. He understood what it meant, and now he understood the new. He understood what the temple meant at one point, and he understood what it meant at his point in time. He's basically saying it meant essentially nothing to God. That's why that veil was rent in, too. And he had moved on. God had moved on. The church had moved on.

Those members of the church that fled a few years later, who saw no need or their descendants to go back to Jerusalem, understood the point of Stephen's message. There was still an affinity and a love for Jerusalem, and even for the temple, for what it stood for, but they knew that it didn't matter, and that they knew that it was different. God was, through his spirit, dwelling within them.

God doesn't dwell in temples made by him. He dwells within us, and that's the lesson, the message of the Day of Pentecost. They had internalized that message. And so those members from Pella who fled understood it. They realized there was no need to stay behind and fight for the temple. There was no need to sacrifice their lives there. They heeded Christ's words. And maybe some of them, but certainly another generation that came 50 or 60 years later, saw no need to compromise their belief in order to gain access to the precincts in the area where that temple once stood 50 years earlier, and to go back. They understood their relationship with God was through the Holy Spirit.

And they understood what the message here from Stephen, at least through this message that he gave, that as we have recorded here, that God is building something different and has been from that Day of Pentecost. So the story of the Church is fascinating because it was on the Day of Pentecost that they heard this voice in the temple that said, Get thee hints. And when you look at their story, understand what we're told from history, you can put it together with some of these scriptures and learn some lessons that at least we can from this particular group of people here. And I think it's a very good lesson for us to learn as we prepare ourselves for the Feast of Pentecost that it's God's Spirit in us. That's what's important. That God doesn't dwell in a building made with hands, a temple like that. That ceased to be important on that day Jesus died. And what is most important is the work of the Holy Spirit within those who are the called and chosen and faithful of God through the ages and certainly today. And as we internalize that and learn that, we are going to be much, much better off as Christians in our relationship with God.

So that's the story of when the Church first fled. And any connection to when it may flee in the future is not there. So we'll talk about that in another time, perhaps. Okay? We'll have another song and then we'll have the announcements and the second split sermon this afternoon.