The Danger of Comfort
Is comfort a good thing? “Of course it is,” you might think. “That one is obvious.” After all, most of us spend a significant chunk of our lives pursuing comfort. We want less stress, more fun, no conflict, zero awkwardness, and lives filled to the brim with joy, love, and ease. You’ll sign up for that right now, huh? However, there is a danger to comfort that should drive us to treat it cautiously. History and Scripture bear this out.
Persecution after the resurrection was like a smoldering fire. It was always there at a base level, but every now and then a flare up would spark anew. Romans did not like that the Christians were exclusive in their worship. Most everyone was polytheistic in that day, and acknowledging the divine origins of the Roman emperor would not be a big deal. However, the Christians refused to worship the emperor as divine. As a result, they were ripe for the picking to be hauled off to die in the arena or be executed. Some rulers were more lenient, others harsh, but if you were a Christian you knew that persecution and martyrdom was always looming.
One of the worst times of persecution was kicked off by the emperor Diocletian in the year AD 303. This was an empire wide effort against Christians where he decreed that the Scriptures should be burned, churches should be burned, and all had to sacrifice to the pagan gods. Thousands of Christians lost their lives during this persecution. If you were living during this time, what would you long for? Freedom and comfort! You would desire to worship Christ without fear of reprisal. You would want to gather in safety. In short, you would like a greater measure of comfort. Yet, until it came, you had to carry on in faithfulness to the Savior.
This time of comfort finally came in AD 313. After a persecution lasting a decade, Constantine came to power decreeing that there was now freedom of worship in the empire. This was called the Edict of Milan, and was exactly what the Christians were looking for with hope. For the first time in Christian history, there was no legal restriction against Christians anywhere in the empire. What a relief! Christians had freedom. They could gather freely. They could build churches. They could evangelize openly. They finally had comfort. What a good thing! Or was it?
Not long ago, I was in Laodicea. This was a city in western Türkiye, and was the home to one of the earliest, largest churches built by those who had known persecution under Diocletian. Since the Christians now had greater comfort, they could turn their attention away from dying in the arena and toward the task of deciding how to exercise this freedom. A regional council met in AD 363 to decide a number facets regarding church worship. Looking through the list of things they thought important is rather bizarre. In it, you see a church very focused on liturgical do’s and don’ts. Here is a sample of the rules that came out of the council.
#15 – No one should ascend the ambon unless he is tonsured. [The ambon is the teaching platform like our pulpit. A tonsure is the shaving of the top part of the head.]
#18 – The same prayers shall be said at nones and vespers. [Structured times of prayer carried over from the early monks.]
#20 – A deacon shall not sit down unless bidden.
#43 – A subdeacon should not leave the gates, even for a short time, to pray.
#44 – The altar must not be approached by women.
#56 – A presbyter shall not enter the bema before the bishop, nor sit down.
Strange, huh? Within one generation we see Christians take their new-found freedom and use it to emphasize a church hierarchy that is very concerned with the method of worship rather than the object of worship. This would only grow in subsequent centuries until the churches of Constantinople and Rome looked very different than the churches established by the apostles.
Granted, not all Christians participated in this drift, but in it I see a warning…there is a danger to comfort. In comfort people will tend to put a greater spotlight on themselves and less of an emphasis on God. This was the reason that Daniel abstained from the rich foods of the Babylonians after his exile. He decided he only wanted water and vegetables because he knew that if he experienced the lavish lifestyle of the Babylonian court then that is all he would want! He would make Babylon his home. Babylon his future. Babylon his love. In the attainment of comfort we see a strong temptation to pursue more comfort which always leads a person away from God. Daniel was living out Proverbs 4:23, “Keep your heart with all vigilance for from it flow the springs of life.”
We live in a time of great comfort. It is all around us. And very easily, we can become distracted by these things just like our Christian fore-bearers were. We start to worry more about having another car or bigger house over making sure our heart is satisfied in Christ alone. We start to focus and plan more for the ease of our daily lives and the next vacation destination more than the eternal soul of our neighbor. We start to think that time on YouTube is more restful for our souls than time in prayer.
I’ve been challenged recently not to accept comfort at face value. There are far more important things in life. Church, we must see the danger! C.T. Studd recognized this deceptive peril as he famously stated, “Only one life will soon be past. Only what’s done for Christ will last.” Christ over comfort. Always.