The Standard January 17, 2026
There are countless beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors that should set apart the Christian from someone who does not believe in and follow God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Extending kindness and hospitality, speaking considerately and truthfully, praying for friends as well as for enemies, welcoming those who are like us and those who are different, putting the needs of others before our own, and forgiving those who have mistreated us are all examples of godly living, enabled by God’s Spirit within us.
In a society which is often hostile to their perception of the Church and the Bible, do we stand out from the crowd in a positive manner? Do we believers live in ways that are obviously different than the prevailing culture? Do we as the Church truly mirror the priorities of Jesus?
The early Church was known for radical generosity. Eusebius, a 4th-century historian wrote of the Plague of Cyprian of the mid 200s AD and the Plague of Maximinus in the early 300s that “All day long some of them [the Christians] tended to the dying and to their burial, countless numbers with no one to care for them. Others gathered together from all parts of the city a multitude of those withered from famine and distributed bread to them all.” Eusebius said everyone was talking about the compassionate works of the Christians and that many unbelievers started to glorify the Christian God.
Julian the Apostate, the last pagan emperor of Rome, did not appreciate the fact that the good deeds of the Christians were causing such a transformation of faith in the general population. He wrote to a pagan priest that the poor were being overlooked and neglected by those of their circle. They failed to give aid to their needy citizens, so Julian proposed that the pagan priests try to imitate the charity of the Christians, in an effort to revive paganism. In Roman culture folks mostly gave gifts to those who could reciprocate, in order to perpetuate the standing of the elites. The Christians were the ones taking care of the needs of the lower classes.
Pastor, theologian, and author Tim Keller once noted, “The early church was strikingly different from the culture around it in this way – the pagan society was stingy with its money and promiscuous with its body. A pagan gave nobody their money and practically gave everybody their body. And the Christians came along and gave practically nobody their body, and they gave practically everybody their money.”
In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus says, “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Matthew 6:19-21
Later in this gospel Jesus is questioned about divorce. “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” Matthew 19:4-6
In the gospels Jesus repeatedly condemns sexual immorality, adultery, and lust. He also teaches about repentance and God’s forgiveness.
Two distinguishing characteristics of Christians should be generosity and sexual purity. Both can present enormous challenges, but will shine the light in a dark world.
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