Participants: Pr Shawn Boonstra
Series Code: SEM
Program Code: SEM000001S
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00:00 [ominous music]
00:04 - [Promoter] The world forever changed his legacy, 00:09 an empire reaching across centuries. 00:12 His name, Constantine. 00:19 "Shadow Empire". 00:22 [dramatic music] 00:31 [foreboding music] 00:36 - This is the city of Nis in the heart of Serbia. 00:39 It's a very old town, one of the oldest in Europe. 00:43 In ancient times, the Romans called it Nassis. 00:46 And it was here some 1,700 years ago 00:49 that a baby was born under a cloud of illegitimacy 00:52 to a very humble and insignificant village girl. 00:56 That baby would grow up 00:57 to completely transform the whole planet. 01:00 In fact, you and I are still living 01:02 under the shadow of his life. 01:04 He has altered the way you think, the way you live, 01:07 and probably the way you believe. 01:12 And this is the ancient land of Israel 01:14 where another even better known baby was born 01:17 some 2,000 years ago to another humble village girl. 01:23 And that baby completely changed the planet 01:27 undeniably to an extent unmatched 01:29 by any other child in history. 01:32 And the paths of these two incredible children 01:35 were destined to cross in ways 01:37 that history has clearly recorded, 01:39 but most of us have forgotten. 01:41 And believe me, our amnesia hasn't done us any favors. 01:48 [dramatic music] 01:58 [suspenseful music] 02:00 It was 271AD and a tired Roman military tribute 02:04 by the name of Flavius Constantius 02:06 was leading his men back from a battle with the Sarmatians, 02:10 a large confederation of ancient Persians that had slowly 02:14 been making their way westward for centuries. 02:17 Eventually, with the help 02:18 of Germanic barbarians like the Goths, 02:21 they started pushing their way into Roman territory, 02:24 something the empire could not allow. 02:27 [foreboding music] 02:36 And on his way back from fighting the Sarmatians, 02:38 Flavius Constantius stopped here 02:40 in what is now the modern day city of Nis 02:43 in a village much like this to get some rest. 02:46 His men spent the night out in the fields, 02:48 but because he was a commanding officer, 02:51 he got to stay in a village inn 02:53 where he could get a great meal, a good night's sleep. 02:56 And unfortunately, something else that soldiers 02:59 sometimes go looking for when they come to town. 03:02 He wanted a little company for the evening. 03:07 According to the story told by an ancient Greek monk, 03:10 Flavius asked the local innkeeper to find him a companion. 03:14 And what usually happened in those days 03:16 is someone would go and fetch a village widow. 03:18 But that night, the innkeeper dispensed with the tradition, 03:21 because he was deeply impressed by the stature 03:24 and bearing of this Roman soldier, 03:26 and he did the unthinkable. 03:28 He sent for his 16-year-old daughter, her name Helena, 03:34 and she would go on to become 03:36 one of the most famous women in history. 03:38 - [Innkeeper] Be kind. 03:42 - The next morning when the sun 03:44 came through the bedroom window, 03:46 Flavius suddenly worried that maybe 03:47 he had offended Apollo, the Sun god. 03:50 So he quickly packed up 03:51 and went out to the fields to his men, 03:54 but just before he left, he gave money to the innkeeper, 03:58 and then he handed him something else, 04:01 an object that would later prove to be very important. 04:09 He gave the innkeeper his tribunal cape, 04:12 which had a buckle with his initials and his military rank. 04:16 "Keep the girl pure," he said, 04:18 "and if by chance she gives birth to a child, 04:20 protect the child as the apple of your eye." 04:24 And then he left town, and of course, the girl was pregnant, 04:28 and she gave birth to a child and named him Constantine, 04:32 which means Little Constantius. 04:35 He was named after his father, 04:37 but his father had no idea he existed. 04:42 [gentle music] 04:45 In fact, his father went to live 04:47 where modern day Budapest now is. 04:49 And from there at the age of 33, 04:51 he was suddenly summoned by the Roman emperor 04:54 to become the Governor of Dalmatia, 04:56 a region in modern day Croatia. 04:59 Now, that appointment was a huge deal, 05:01 because Dalmatia was a key Roman territory 05:04 where the empire controlled the flow of trade 05:06 between east and west. 05:09 If you became the Governor of Dalmatia, 05:12 it meant you were on your way up. 05:14 Now, that appointment also sealed the fate 05:16 of Helena and little Constantine, 05:19 because of course, she was nothing but a humble peasant. 05:23 And the father of the boy 05:24 was now at the top of Roman society. 05:27 He was now famous enough 05:29 that she probably knew exactly where he was, 05:32 but ancient Roman civilization was not exactly egalitarian. 05:37 She had no way to contact the father, 05:40 because that would never be allowed. 05:46 That should have been the end of the story. 05:48 Just another baby born to another peasant girl, 05:51 and nobody cares. 05:53 Except that almost a decade later 05:55 something remarkable happens. 05:57 Another group of Roman soldiers stops 05:59 at the village inn in Nis for the night, 06:02 and they found little Constantine, 06:04 now nine years old, teasing their horses. 06:08 That made them angry. 06:09 So, they started to hit the boy, 06:12 and his mom heard the commotion 06:13 and came running into the barn. 06:14 "Stop," she said, "don't you know who that is? 06:17 You are hitting the governor's son." 06:19 "Do you take us for fools?" they said. 06:24 "I swear to the gods. I'm telling the truth," she said. 06:27 When Flavius Constantius was just a tribune, 06:29 he slept here and I became pregnant. 06:33 - What proof do you have of such a name? 06:34 - [Shawn] "If you want proof, I can give it to you." 06:38 That's when she pulled out the cape. 06:40 - FC Flavius Constantius. 06:44 - Imagine the panic those men must have felt 06:46 when they saw the initials, 06:47 Flavius Constantius, Governor of Dalmatia. 06:53 The good news is they did the right thing. 06:56 They went and told the governor 06:57 he had a son living in Nassis. 07:01 The governor was delighted. 07:02 He sent for the boy immediately. 07:05 Helena was now 26 years old, 07:07 and the reunion went as well as you might imagine. 07:10 She was welcomed into the governor's house with open arms. 07:14 There was only one problem. 07:15 There was no way Flavius Constantius could marry her, 07:19 because she was a peasant. 07:21 And it wasn't because Flavius 07:23 thought he was too good for Helena. 07:24 In fact, he himself had been raised by shepherds 07:27 in a village just a few miles north of this location. 07:31 The problem was that society didn't allow it. 07:35 She could go and live in his house, 07:37 but she could not be his wife. 07:39 It turns out that young Constantine and his mother 07:42 were not a fit for high Roman society. 07:46 [suspenseful music] 07:49 Neither was that other baby born 300 years earlier 07:52 in Bethlehem to another young mother 07:55 who didn't have a husband when she found herself pregnant. 07:58 Her name, of course, was Mary, and the child was Jesus. 08:03 And as the whole world knows, He was cruelly put to death 08:06 on an instrument of torture, 08:08 actually, concocted by earlier pagan societies, 08:11 but perfected into a grizzly sadistic science 08:15 by none other than the Roman Empire. 08:18 The followers of Jesus were not particularly welcome 08:21 in the city of Jerusalem, 08:22 because they were perceived to be a threat 08:24 to the traditional religion of Moses. 08:27 And in time, the burgeoning movement of Christians 08:30 also found themselves at odds with the entire Roman Empire. 08:38 [playful music] 08:43 This is a bridge built some 60 years 08:45 before the birth of Christ. 08:47 And wouldn't you know it? 08:48 The bridge is still in service today. 08:51 Now, you wanna pay attention to bridges 08:53 as we unfold the rest of our story, 08:55 because they'll prove to be very important. 08:58 This bridge is a remarkable example 09:01 of just how skilled the Romans were. 09:03 They managed to build an international infrastructure, 09:06 one that held together an empire made up of 09:08 hundreds of different cultures and nationalities. 09:12 You had the Jews to the east, the Barbarians to the north, 09:16 and the ancient civilizations 09:18 of Greece, Persia, and North Africa, 09:20 all in one empire that somehow 09:23 was remarkably stable and peaceful. 09:28 After Augusta Caesar's victory 09:30 at the Battle of Actium in 27BC, 09:33 the Roman Empire became very stable and predictable. 09:36 It was a good place to live. 09:38 To the point where people spoke of Pax Romana. 09:41 Now, you've probably heard that expression. 09:43 It means the Peace of Rome. 09:46 From northern Europe to North Africa, 09:48 from Spain to the Middle East, 09:50 you could count on Roman water, Roman highways, 09:53 Roman courts, and Roman law. 09:56 Even though the people were conquered subjects, 09:59 most of them still liked living in the world of the Romans, 10:02 because it was a great place to live. 10:10 It was the person of the emperor 10:12 that served as a focal point for unity. 10:16 Conquered people had almost absolute freedom of conscience. 10:19 They could go on worshiping whatever God they wanted. 10:22 They could stick with the religion of their ancestors 10:24 just as long as they also acknowledged 10:27 the deity of the Roman emperor. 10:29 He was considered the embodiment of Roma, 10:32 the goddess of Rome. 10:34 Now, in reality, nobody actually, 10:37 thought the Emperor was a divine being, 10:39 especially, if you happen to grow up with the guy, 10:42 but during the reign of Augustus Caesar, the unity, 10:45 the hard won peace of the empire became so important 10:49 that emperor worship became a symbol of national unity. 10:53 Everybody knew he wasn't really a god, 10:55 but you offered him a little worship anyway 10:57 to prove your allegiance to the gods of Rome 11:00 and to the whole empire. 11:02 [gentle music] 11:06 All you really had to do, especially in later years, 11:09 was offer this tiny little pinch of incense 11:11 to the Emperor just once in a while. 11:15 Then you could go back to life as normal. 11:17 Essentially, you barely had to acknowledge 11:20 the deity of the Emperor. 11:22 Now, that was required for everybody except the Jews 11:26 who had a national exemption. 11:28 And how did they get that exemption? 11:29 Well, they had proven so helpful 11:31 to Julius Caesar during his conquest 11:34 that they got a formal legal excuse 11:37 from those kinds of regulations. 11:39 They didn't have to acknowledge the Emperor as a god. 11:42 They just had to promise to pray for him 11:44 and for the health of the empire. 11:46 And of course, given all the options, 11:49 that was something they were quite happy to do. 11:51 Now, the Romans had a word for the Jewish faith. 11:54 They called it a religio. 11:56 It's where we get the word religion. 11:58 And a religio was a national faith, 12:01 a religion that actually defined the whole nation itself. 12:07 Now, in the very beginning, 12:08 the followers of Jesus were also considered a religio, 12:12 because as far as the average Roman could tell 12:15 there was really no difference between Jews and Christians. 12:18 Christians were just one more set of Jews. 12:22 But then a few years went by and a radical separation 12:25 started taking place between the two groups. 12:28 As time went by, Christians were no longer 12:31 called a religio, a national religion. 12:34 Now, they were called superstitio. 12:36 It's where we get the word superstition. 12:39 Suddenly, the Christians had no more legal exemption, 12:43 and they too were required to acknowledge 12:46 the deity of the Roman emperor. 12:52 [suspenseful music] 13:02 [suspenseful music continues] 13:09 A little more than 200 years after Christ, 13:12 right here in the city of Rome, 13:14 there was this great example 13:16 of the problem that early Christians faced. 13:19 There were probably about 30,000 of them 13:21 living in the city at the time. 13:23 And the Emperor Trajan Decius passed a law saying 13:27 that every male citizen had to buy a sacrificial animal, 13:31 bring it to the temple for ritual cooking, 13:34 publicly consume some of the meat, 13:36 and then offer some wine to the genius 13:39 or the guiding spirit of the emperor. 13:42 In other words, they had to recognize the emperor as a god. 13:47 Now, if you did that, if you performed the rituals, 13:49 you got a signed certificate, 13:51 but if you didn't, 13:52 you were considered a traitor to the empire. 13:56 [suspenseful music continues] 14:02 At other times, and with other emperors, 14:04 all you really had to do was just offer 14:06 that tiny pinch of incense, 14:08 a token ritual that proved you were loyal. 14:12 Now, for the most part, Christians didn't have a problem 14:14 with being loyal to government, 14:16 because their scriptures, actually, 14:18 taught them to be good citizens, 14:20 but they could not, they would not, 14:22 participate in a Roman religious ritual, 14:25 because they were monotheistic 14:27 just like their Jewish cousins. 14:29 They acknowledged the existence of just one God, 14:32 and that God they said, had come to Earth in human form. 14:35 He'd been put to death on a Roman cross, 14:39 and then He rose from the dead. 14:41 That same God in human flesh would come again 14:43 to judge the living and the dead, 14:46 and then He would set up a kingdom of His own. 14:54 So, now the Christians were perceived 14:56 as a clear threat to Pax Romana. 14:58 They were an unstable element. 15:01 They clearly served a different king, 15:03 which might have been fine as long 15:05 as Caesar was still at the top of the heap. 15:08 The problem was Christians only had one king, 15:11 and they spoke about the day 15:13 when their king would overthrow every other empire. 15:16 These people were conversant 15:18 in the ancient prophecies of Daniel, 15:20 which spoke of a time when Messiah's kingdom 15:22 would destroy every single human kingdom 15:25 and replace them for all time. 15:28 Their Jesus was not just Messiah, 15:30 He was not just the son of God, 15:33 He was the king of kings and Lord of lords. 15:37 Here's how the prophet Daniel described Him. 15:41 "Then to Him was given dominion and glory 15:43 and a kingdom that all people's nations 15:45 and languages should serve Him. 15:47 His dominion is an everlasting dominion, 15:50 which shall not pass away, 15:52 and His kingdom the one which shall not be destroyed." 15:57 [ominous music] 16:03 It's not hard to see why the Romans 16:06 weren't keen on this brand new sect. 16:08 It didn't help that Christians were distancing themselves 16:11 from some of the day-to-day activities 16:13 the average Roman enjoyed. 16:15 For example, Christians weren't keen on Roman entertainment, 16:19 because it was so violent. 16:22 From what I understand historically speaking, 16:23 sometimes when a Roman play called for a death scene, 16:27 condemned prisoners were actually murdered right on stage 16:31 to make it seem more realistic. 16:33 And of course, Christians weren't interested 16:35 in watching that kind of stuff. 16:37 They served a Creator God, a God of love and redemption. 16:42 Then there was the issue of healthcare. 16:44 A lot of the hospitals were dedicated 16:46 to the pagan gods of healing, 16:48 which wouldn't have been a huge problem, 16:51 except that sometimes the priest of the serpent god 16:54 would actually come right into your hospital room 16:56 and involve you in his pagan rituals. 16:59 Public education also posed a bit of a problem, 17:01 because the value system taught by Roman educators 17:05 was essentially at odds with Christian belief. 17:08 And if you sent your kids to a Roman school, 17:11 they would be subjected to pagan religion. 17:14 They would learn different theories 17:16 about philosophical truth or the origins of the human race 17:19 and the meaning of life. 17:21 And while Christians have never 17:23 really shied away from other people's ideas, 17:26 they didn't wanna expose their kids 17:29 to that stuff at a young age. 17:32 [ominous music continues] 17:41 [ominous music continues] 17:47 In the second century, the Emperor Trajan, 17:50 the one who actually built this famous marketplace, 17:53 he sent a new governor to Asia Minor 17:55 to rule a region called Bifinia. 17:58 And in one town in that region, 18:00 there were people complaining about the Christians. 18:03 What was the complaint? 18:04 Well, the local butchers weren't selling enough meat. 18:07 So, how could that be the Christian's fault? 18:10 Well, a lot of the meat was earmarked 18:12 for sacrifices to the pagan gods, 18:14 and the influence of Christianity 18:16 had supposedly put a massive dent in sales. 18:20 So, the butchers blame the Christians for their woes. 18:26 Now, at first, the new governor, 18:28 a guy by the name of Pliny the Younger, 18:31 he didn't see a problem. 18:33 He wrote back to the Emperor and said, 18:35 "I don't know what all the fuss is about. 18:36 I still see all kinds of meat for sale in the market. 18:40 I think those butchers are exaggerating." 18:43 But you know, facts seldom matter in a world 18:45 where people want a scapegoat. 18:47 So, even though the accusation 18:49 against the Christians had little substance, 18:51 Pliny executed a few of them anyway 18:54 just to keep the merchants happy. 18:57 And he was, actually, happy to do that, 18:59 because he found Christians inflexible, 19:02 unwilling to compromise on certain principles. 19:06 All across the empire, suddenly there were 19:08 these anti-Christian pamphlets in circulation, 19:11 and the rumor mills started to fill in blanks 19:13 wherever Romans struggled to understand the new faith. 19:17 They heard about Christians who met in secret, 19:20 and that was actually true. 19:22 Some of them had to meet in secret, 19:24 because Romans were suspicious of any gatherings 19:27 that involved more than a few people. 19:29 They always feared that bigger groups, 19:31 say more than a dozen, 19:33 might become a breeding ground for political unrest. 19:36 And of course, large group of Christians 19:38 did meet for worship so they were immediately suspect. 19:42 Many Christians were forced to meet in secret. 19:47 [foreboding music] 19:57 Then the general public started to hear 19:58 about the communion service, 20:00 where, supposedly, Christians were eating human flesh 20:03 and drinking human blood. 20:04 What they were doing, of course, 20:05 was eating bread and drinking wine, 20:07 symbols of the body and blood of Jesus, 20:09 but facts seldom matter to people who want to hear rumors. 20:13 They called those communion services, 20:15 agape feasts, love feasts. 20:17 So, obviously, they were wild orgies. 20:20 The Christians were people of low morals 20:22 who ate human flesh, they were cannibals. 20:25 And then the story started to go around, 20:27 "Watch out for those Christians. 20:29 You never know when they might come after your kids." 20:35 [crowds screaming] 20:40 This is that moment in history when all those stories 20:42 you heard in school started to take place. 20:45 Christians were put to death in the arena. 20:47 Now, we don't actually know of any Christians 20:49 who died here in the Colosseum, 20:51 but they were put to death in other venues. 20:54 At one point, apparently, Nero had Christians dipped in tar, 20:58 nailed to crosses, and then lit on fire 21:01 so that he could use them as nightlights at his games. 21:05 He wrapped them in animal skins 21:06 and fed them to wild animals. 21:09 They became the outcasts of Roman society. 21:12 They did not fit in. 21:15 And then they became convenience scapegoats. 21:18 There was one occasion toward the end of the first century 21:20 when the city of Rome actually burned to the ground, 21:23 or at least a big part of it did. 21:26 And the day that happened, 21:27 apparently, the Emperor Nero was somewhere out of town. 21:31 Yet, people still suspected 21:33 that he might have started the fire himself 21:35 in order to make room for his projects. 21:38 And that's when the Christians suddenly got the blame. 21:45 [somber music] 21:55 [somber music continues] 22:00 A rumor spread all through the city. 22:02 "We've heard that Christians believe 22:04 the world will end in fire, 22:05 and we think they started the fire 22:07 to make their own prophecy come true." 22:10 Again, that was an absolute distortion 22:12 of what Christians actually believed, 22:14 but that didn't matter. 22:16 The Christians got the blame, 22:17 and Nero probably relieved to be out of the spotlight, 22:21 went after them. 22:22 From that point on, Christian leaders 22:24 were persecuted with some regularity. 22:30 [somber music continues] 22:33 Even then, the Christians weren't really 22:36 on the Emperor's radar, not yet. 22:38 Some historians suggest that Nero, 22:40 actually, blamed another easy target, the poor, 22:44 because he knew nobody would stand up for them. 22:47 And among the poor, there were lots and lots of Christians, 22:50 because from the very start, 22:52 Christianity was the religion of a poor carpenter's son. 22:57 It was a religion of outcasts, the downtrodden. 23:00 It was a movement started by a man 23:02 who spent his time with tax collectors 23:04 and lepers and prostitutes. 23:07 In the very beginning, 23:08 Christianity was not a religion of the rich. 23:11 To use the words of the book of Hebrews, 23:14 "It was a faith for people 23:16 of whom the world was not worthy." 23:19 And when poor Christians faced death, 23:22 they did it so fearlessly that people noticed. 23:25 They stood out from the other poor people. 23:28 And after a while, the Christians were so notable 23:31 that they became the number one scapegoat, 23:34 the very face of the Emperor's problems. 23:37 So, you can see Christians 23:39 did not fit into the Roman empire. 23:42 Jesus wasn't particularly welcome 23:44 in the highest levels of Roman society. 23:47 Not only was there no room for Jesus 23:49 at the inn of Bethlehem, 23:51 apparently, there wasn't much room 23:54 for Him in the Emperor's palace either. 23:58 [people chatting] 24:04 There were also some key philosophical objections 24:07 the Romans had to Christianity, 24:08 and these are really important, 24:10 because they prove what Constantine was doing 24:12 and not doing in later years. 24:15 Today, some people say that Constantine 24:17 invented the idea of Christ's divinity. 24:20 I've heard people claim that, 24:21 that idea didn't show up for some 300 years after Jesus. 24:25 But if you go back and read what the ancient Romans said 24:28 about Christians in the first two centuries, 24:30 it's obvious that they were worshiping Christ. 24:34 In fact, there was a harsh Roman critic, 24:36 a guy by the name of Celsus 24:37 who lived in the last half of the second century, 24:40 and he detested the Christians. 24:43 He was a big deal, he was very popular, 24:45 so popular that Christians 24:47 felt obliged to answer his accusations. 24:51 And what exactly did Celsus hate about Christians? 24:55 Well, for starters, he hated the idea of the incarnation. 24:58 This idea that Jesus is God in human flesh. 25:02 According to Celsus, for God to change from good to bad, 25:05 from beautiful to shameful, from happiness to misfortune, 25:11 well, to him that was unthinkable. 25:12 He didn't see God's condescension as an act of love. 25:15 He figured that the very act of God 25:18 being born in Bethlehem as a human 25:20 would be far beneath the dignity of a supreme being. 25:24 Now, there was another reason 25:25 he didn't like the idea that Jesus was God. 25:28 Some prominent Roman thinkers were already moving 25:31 toward the idea of just one god, 25:34 and Jesus seemed like a second god. 25:36 So, Celsus considered worshiping Jesus 25:39 to be some kind of relapse into polytheism 25:43 and all that business about Jesus coming back from the dead, 25:47 well, it was obvious to him that can't happen. 25:51 [ominous music] 26:00 [ominous music continues] 26:09 [ominous music continues] 26:16 In later years, another pagan philosopher 26:18 by the name of Porphyry told the Roman world 26:21 that Christians were unsophisticated simpletons 26:24 that were holding back the progress of civilization. 26:29 In Porphyry's opinion, Christians were a huge detriment 26:32 to the advancement of logic and science. 26:35 So, as you can see, in the Roman world, 26:39 the worth of Jesus would have to be proved. 26:44 [suspenseful music] 26:49 Just like the worth of Constantine, 26:52 It wasn't until that cape came out of storage 26:55 that Helena could prove her boy was important. 27:00 And even when they finally arrived in the governor's palace, 27:02 almost 10 years after his birth, 27:05 she was still an uneasy fit. 27:08 Low class peasant, unfit to be a governor's wife, 27:14 but she was good enough to be a concubine. 27:17 You see there was this Roman law 27:19 that could help make Constantine legitimate. 27:22 They called it concubine marriage. 27:23 Now, it wasn't full-fledged Roman marriage. 27:27 This was something you could end quite easily. 27:29 Divorce was simple, 27:31 but it still gave the young Constantine something, 27:35 some kind of claim to legitimacy. 27:38 Gave him a home, and it gave him a headstart 27:41 in an empire he would eventually control. 27:44 [suspenseful music continues] 27:55 [suspenseful music continues] 28:05 [suspenseful music continues] 28:09 - [Promoter] This has been a broadcast 28:11 of The Voice of Prophecy. 28:13 To learn more about how you can get a DVD copy 28:15 of "Shadow Empire" for yourself, 28:18 please visit ShadowEmpireDVD.com 28:22 or call toll free 844-822-2943. |
Revised 2023-08-24