Standing Firm: The Legacy of Saint Athanasius

And the proverb was, as you may know, "Athanasius contra mundum," "Athanasius against the world." Where did that proverb come from? How did it arise? What did it mean to say, "Athanasius against the world?" Well, that's part of what we want to look at this morning, because he illustrates for us, because he encourages us to think about what it means to take a heroic stand for Christ, even when it appears that everyone stands against you. [00:02:50]

And Athanasius was one of the great champions of these verses, one of the ones who said, "We have to understand these verses faithfully, carefully, and profoundly, if we're under, to understand Jesus Christ, who He is, and what He's done for us. And he became a champion particularly of the eternal divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ. He became a champion of that little phrase, "The Word was God." And in defense of that, he gave his life. [00:05:18]

He was a lighthouse. He revealed the error and he showed the truth. And that's what it meant for Athanasius, when necessary, to stand against the world. The first thing that he did in standing against the world was to stand for the truth. Augustine once said, speaking about martyrdom, he said, (speaking in Latin). "It's the cause, not the punishment, that makes the martyr." [00:10:28]

And Athanasius and those who stood with him said, "It matters profoundly. It matters absolutely. It matters, and we cannot let people take refuge in ambiguous language and in the abuse of the Bible and pretend to believe the Bible when they really don't. And sometimes to accomplish that purpose, to flush out the heretic, you have to come up with a technical language that is sufficiently precise and careful and exact that it can filter out heresy. [00:15:57]

And someone came up with the word, "Homoousios," a Greek word meaning, "The same substance." The same substance. And some of Arius' defenders got very nervous and they said, "That's not a biblical word. You can't make people believe that." And the response was, "It expresses clearly and inescapably the biblical truth. The Son is of the same divine substance as the Father." [00:21:31]

And what we begin to see is that the issue of who Jesus is inextricably bound with the question of, what does Jesus do? What has Jesus done for us? Arius said, "Jesus has taught us about the Father as God." Well, that was true as far as it went. "Jesus has shown us as a great example how a human being should live." Well, that's true as far as it goes. [00:28:14]

If Jesus is not divine, He cannot have offered a sacrifice of infinite value for His people on the cross. He cannot be a Savior to save us to the uttermost. He cannot be a Savior to fully satisfy the wrath of God. He cannot be a Savior who can hear the cries of His people and come to help us and come to forgive us. These are not esoteric theological issues. [00:29:21]

In the end of the day, you cannot stand for the truth without standing against the lie. There are some people who want to be positive all the time, and I like those people. They're nicer than the people I hang around with. But the truth is, to really make the truth known, to really defend the truth, to really grasp the truth, we have to be willing also to stand against the lie. [00:32:31]

And Athanasius began the first of five exiles that would take place during the forty-five years he served as bishop. He was exiled a total of about seventeen years out of the forty-five he was bishop. Five times exiled by emperors from his see. Athanasius against the world. This is a remarkably dramatic moment for him. He's exiled. He's in many ways abandoned. And Arius is triumphant. [00:39:24]

And wee little Athanasius said, "I will stand against the world if I'm standing for Christ and standing for the truth and standing for the gospel." On another occasion, he was leading a worship service in his cathedral church in Alexandria, and the imperial troops—this was about twenty years later, the imperial troops surrounded the church and they entered the building, and they were clearly on their way to arrest Athanasius and carry him off to what would be his third exile. [00:41:51]

And the glorious truth for us out of the life of Athanasius is that the Word of God is always true, that the Word of God is always fulfilled, that we can have absolute confidence in the Word of God and what it says about the person of Christ, about the work of Christ, about the future of Christ's church. The gates of hell will not prevail against it. [00:50:14]

And Christ will build His church in every generation, not perhaps with the success that the world will count success, but through courageous Christians who will stand contra mundum; for the truth, against the lie, and on the Word. And I think the reason you're at this conference is you want to be built up in that kind of faith, in that kind of commitment, to show that kind of courage. [00:50:37]