Por Leonarda Andino.
It is noted in history that about the year 64 after the birth of Jesus the Christ, during the cruelest moments of the Christian persecution by the Roman Emperor, Nero, the apostles Peter in a rush to safeguard his own life from that loquacious man, he chose to flee the city of Rome. While he was traversing the “Via Apia” of that great city in a wagon, he suddenly saw a luminous splendor that allowed him to visualize the Lord Jesus Christ carrying upwards a cross. Peter, engulfed by fear launched the question: “Quo vadis domine? Which interpreted means where goes thou, oh, Lord?
The answer of the Lord was blunt and resounding: “Since you are leaving and have abandoned my sheep, I return to Rome to be crucified once again.” After such an astounding reflection, Peter desists of his intent to leave the city and chooses to remain in order to fulfill the “Great Commission.” History and more particularly, the scriptures tell us that this courageous and intrepid man suffered all sorts of penalties and tribulations for the truth’s sake. Peter was a martyr of the church; and he was also crucified but with his head downwards, for he said that he was not worthy to suffer death likewise his master.
QUO VADIS DOMINE, a powerful phrase, of Latin origin, it is taken by the Polish Henryk Sienkiewiez to write the Novel, “Quo vadis?” This is just a sample of the cruel persecution of the Roman emperor, Nero against Christians.
The Great Mission. Today, the scenery of the Christian church has changed. Others had paid the ransom, they were persecuted, incarcerated, traveled by inhospitable places and some even sacrificed the life of their children for the cause of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Nowadays, we find people like John Wesley, whose transforming message drove him to impact the English Society and to found the most notable and blessed churches of his day and age. He preached up to six sermons per day and it did not matter where he traveled. In those days, the English society was so immerged in vice and debauchery that six of ever ten houses were saloons.
The previous connotation may move us to reflect for better or worse what we live in our very own day: What moved those men to act in those days? Has the mission of the church changed in our day? Jesus Christ, after his resurrection and before he ascended to heaven gave clear and concise indications to his disciples of what we recognize today as “The Great Commission.” He said to his eleven:
Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.
(New Testament Matthew 28:19 - 20)
As far as Honduras it is concerned, if we put ourselves in the national context, Honduras has been a country of Christian tradition. Today, studies confirm a strong religious revival of the evangelical denomination in its diverse factions in front of the Catholic Church who since inception of our national heritage, it has been a great majority. The growth is strong in the sector of women and the youth; and in some instances it reaches up to 35%
Today, in the Honduran country we see a flourishing evangelical movement, yet it is varied. It is understood to say that in the market of faith there is an option for every taste. And it is worth to note that there could be but a small reduct that attempts to preach the Great Commission, the message of the strait and narrow passage, the love for one another, humility, perseverance, etc. It in this particular way that a convulsed society, submissive into poverty where the moral values have been set aside, where the following questions truly fit: Where has the church been? Have we continued with the resolve to preach the great commission?
First, just in a few years we saw with great astonishment how some evangelical pastors left their rameumptom to fight for a putrid stand in the national congress of the republic. From their pulpits they begun to preach the politics of the day, messages that added to the uprising theology of prosperity that has mined or polluted all religious congregations of the world.
The Bible is clear and most explicit when it dictates that:
No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier.
(New Testament 2 Timothy 2:4)
Jesus made a very clear distinction between things divine and those that are worldly when he was set to fall into a snare he replied:
Render therefore unto Cæsar the things which are Cæsar's; and unto God the things that are God's.
(New Testament Matthew 22:21)
He said that we cannot serve two masters because we either love one or despise the other.
Two factions claim protagonism in these turbid facts. These are: the church and the Honduran armed forces. Why the church does takes part in these scenic debates? How do they explain their performance? If it is clear as it is explained that the state is laic; and the faith or the church is commonly placed in the private plane.
Dr. Juan Almendáres, cites how the church constitutes itself in the ideological front that has the country of Honduras submerged in a grave political crisis with strong economical and social repercussions that have divided as never the Honduran society.
Is this the script of the church? The answer to this question is a definitively NO. The Lord Jesus Christ never sought worldly positions; neither did he seek for recognition. Neither did he chose the side of power among men. Today, with the recent conflict that polarize more and more the Honduran society, right after “the cup de etat,” of June the 28th, part of the evangelical leadership placed themselves at one side of the balance; and presumptuously, they have spoken in behalf of the filigrees. Many of us, also Christians, ask ourselves: Why do they speak in our name?
In a conscientious analysis of the risen facts, Leticia Solomon, a renowned sociologist, points out that there are two sectors that seek recognition, with this we do not mean to say that the church nowadays would have better chosen the other side. On the contrary, their leaders should have, fed the multitude; to step forwards with the weightier matters of the law and search with due diligence the lost sheep; to preach the good news; to impact a society thirsty of truth, justice and mercy. These and other moral and virtuous values are the ones that we lose when we apostatize or when we strive away from the strait and narrow path and cease to preach the true gospel of Jesus Christ. The scriptures cannot be denied when they say:
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone. Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel.
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchers, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchers of the righteous, and say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets. Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets. Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers. Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?
(New Testament Matthew 23:23 - 33)
Jesus meant well when he said that if his disciples would shut up; the stones would jump and speak in their behalf. In the midst of these perilous times: Will the master come again carrying on his shoulder the wooden symbol to be once again crucified? Would there be one that like Peter would want to re-take the painful way?
Leonarda Andino.
God forbids, if no one is of stature and apt to the task, Oh, Lord, here am I, send me.
Miguel Angel Tinoco Rodriguez,
This article is inspired and despite of source the distinctive authorship belongs to God, the creator of heavens and earth. This work of faith has been properly interpreted from the original script in the Spanish language; and also scribed, arranged, enlarged in scope by inspiration to ad due value and force; and it is adapted by inspiration and by the power and the gift of tongues by someone who in unlearned but who is commissioned and has proper authority to act in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Leonarda Andino, a learned scholar, by virtue unknown to the world, has been a chosen vessel in the hands of God to produce this marvelous work and a wonder for a purpose which wisdom remains within God and him alone. And that her portion will not be taken from her. Be it known to all peoples, nations and tongues that she, as a scholar, has a master in communications and educative technologies. She is also a recognized periodist. Actually, she is the coordinator of academics and Vice-rector of the academy of the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Honduras. UNAH. leonardaandi@yahoo.com